THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE WORKS OF 
 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 
 
 CORNHILL EDITION 
 VOLUME III
 
 Eoehrns Statuette of Thackeray
 
 THE HISTORY OF 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 
 
 WITH THE AUTHOR'S ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 VOLUME I 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 1911
 
 Copyright, 1904, by 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
 
 College 
 
 JJLrary 
 
 PR, 
 
 OTE 
 
 PENDENNIS was written between the middle of 1848 and 
 the late autumn of 1850. As in the case of VANITY FAIR, 
 its ending is recorded in a letter from Thackeray to 
 his mother: "having completed my story this day, 
 and wrote Finis, I am very tired, weary, and solemn - 
 minded." 
 
 The story has a fuller personal history perhaps than 
 any other of Thackeray's novels. Without straining the 
 point of its autobiographical character, (as has been 
 done, perhaps, by quoting a well-known letter to Mrs. 
 Brookfield in which he speaks of the resemblance between 
 Pendennis and himself, ) we at least know that the story 
 makes more use of obviously autobiographical material 
 than any other ; and it connects itself with the places and 
 passages of Thackeray's life so closely that its identifica- 
 tions have been a favourite theme with every biographer. 
 Clavering is confessedly Ottery St. Mary's in Devon- 
 shire, near which Thackeray's mother lived when he was 
 a boy. Pendennis's and Warrington's life in the Tem- 
 ple is locally reminiscent of Thackeray's life there, when 
 he read law in Taprell's Chambers on the ground floor 
 of No. 1, Hare Court, pictured in the frontispiece to 
 the second volume in this edition. Persistent tradition 
 has it that the chambers on the third floor of this build- 
 
 V 
 
 833194
 
 ing were those where he meant Pen and Warrington to 
 live, and that Hare Court is the original of Lamb Court. 
 The Oxbridge passages derived similarly from Thack- 
 eray's experiences at Cambridge, where his rooms in 
 Trinity are known still. 
 
 Like VANITY FAIR, PENDENNIS was published by 
 Bradbury and Evans in monthly numbers, the first in 
 November, 1848; but the publication was interrupted in 
 September of the next year by Thackeray's almost fatal 
 illness, and not resumed until the beginning of 1850. 
 From this, as every reader of the novel knows, came the 
 dedication to Dr. Elliotson. 
 
 The original numbers, like those of VANITY FAIR, had 
 covers and title-pages designed by Thackeray; and the 
 story, like that, was illustrated throughout by him. The 
 serial publication was finished in twenty-four numbers 
 in December, 1850, and the book issued in two volumes. 
 The titles of both are here reproduced. The design on 
 the monthly covers was identical with the first of these, 
 and is therefore not repeated separately. 
 
 The portrait frontispiece is from the statuette by Sir 
 Joseph Edgar Boehm.
 
 BY 
 
 M THACKE1RAY
 
 BY 
 
 W.M.THACKLRAT.
 
 TO DR. JOHN ELLIOTSON 
 
 MY DEAR DOCTOR, 
 
 Thirteen months ago, when it seemed likely that 
 this story had come to a close, a kind friend brought you 
 to my bedside, whence, in all probability, I never should 
 have risen but for your constant watchfulness and skill. 
 I like to recall your great goodness and kindness (as well 
 as many acts of others, showing quite a surprising friend- 
 ship and sympathy) at that time, when kindness and 
 friendship were most needed and welcome. 
 
 And as you would take no other fee but thanks, let 
 me record them here in behalf of me and mine, and sub- 
 scribe myself, 
 
 Yours most sincerely and gratefully, 
 
 W. M. THACKERAY.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 IF this kind of composition, of which the two years' 
 product is now laid before the public, fail in art, as it 
 constantly does and must, it at least has the advantage 
 of a certain truth and honesty, which a work more elabo- 
 rate might lose. In his constant communication with 
 the reader, the writer is forced into frankness of expres- 
 sion, and to speak out his own mind and feelings as they 
 urge him. Many a slip of the pen and the printer, many 
 a word spoken in haste, he sees and would recall as he 
 looks over his volume. It is a sort of confidential talk 
 between writer and reader, which must often be dull, 
 must often flag. In the course of his volubility, the per- 
 petual speaker must of necessity lay bare his own weak- 
 nesses, vanities, peculiarities. And as we judge of a 
 man's character, after long frequenting his society, not 
 by one speech, or by one mood or opinion, or by one day's 
 talk, but by the tenor of his general bearing and conver- 
 sation; so of a writer, who delivers himself up to you 
 perforce unreservedly, you say, Is he honest? Does he 
 tell the truth in the main? Does he seem actuated by a 
 desire to find out and speak it? Is he a quack, who shams 
 sentiment, or mouths for effect? Does he seek popu- 
 larity by claptraps or other arts? I can no more ignore 
 good fortune than any other chance which has befallen
 
 xiv PREFACE 
 
 me. I have found many thousands more readers than 
 I ever looked for. I have no right to say to these, You 
 shall not find fault with my art, or fall asleep over my 
 pages ; but I ask you to believe that this person writing 
 strives to tell the truth. If there is not that, there is 
 nothing. 
 
 ' Perhaps the lovers of " excitement " may care to know, 
 that this book began with a very precise plan, which was 
 entirely put aside. Ladies and gentlemen, you were to 
 have been treated, and the writer's and the publisher's 
 pocket benefited, by the recital of the most active hor- 
 rors. What more exciting than a ruffian (with many 
 admirable virtues) in St. Giles's, visited constantly by a 
 young lady from Belgravia? What more stirring than 
 the contrasts of society? the mixture of slang and fash- 
 ionable language? the escapes, the battles, the murders? 
 Nay, up to nine o'clock this very morning, my poor 
 friend, Colonel Altamont, was doomed to execution, and 
 the author only relented when his victim was actually at 
 the window. 
 
 The " exciting " plan was laid aside (with a very hon- 
 ourable forbearance on the part of the publishers), be- 
 cause, on attempting it, I found that I failed from want 
 of experience of my subject; and never having been 
 intimate with any convict in my life, and the manners 
 of ruffians and gaol-birds being quite unfamiliar to me, 
 the idea of entering into competition with M. Eugene 
 Sue was abandoned. To describe a real rascal, you must
 
 PREFACE xv 
 
 make him so horrible that he would be too hideous to 
 show; and unless the painter paints him fairly, I hold 
 he has no right to show him at all. 
 
 Even the gentlemen of our age this is an attempt to 
 describe one of them, no better nor worse than most edu- 
 cated men even these we cannot show as they are, with 
 the notorious foibles and selfishness of their lives and 
 their education. Since the author of Tom Jones was 
 buried, no writer of fiction among us has been permitted 
 to depict to his utmost power a MAN. We must drape 
 him, and give him a certain conventional simper. Soci- 
 ety will not tolerate the Natural in our Art. Many ladies 
 have remonstrated and subscribers left me, because in the 
 course of the story, I described a young man resisting 
 and affected by temptation. My object was to say, that 
 he had the passions to feel, and the manliness and gener- 
 osity to overcome them. You will not hear it is best 
 to know it what moves in the real world, what passes 
 in society, in the clubs, colleges, mess-rooms, what is 
 the life and talk of your sons. A little more frankness 
 than is customary has been attempted in this story ; with 
 no bad desire on the writer's part, it is hoped, and with 
 no ill consequence to any reader. If truth is not always 
 pleasant ; at any rate truth is best, from whatever chair 
 from those whence graver writers or thinkers argue, 
 as from that at which the story-teller sits as he concludes 
 his labour, and bids his kind reader farewell. 
 
 KENSINGTON, Nov. 26th, 1850.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 i SHOWS How FIRST LOVE MAY INTERRUPT BREAKFAST 1 
 
 ii A PEDIGREE AND OTHER FAMILY MATTERS .... 8 
 
 HI IN WHICH PENDENNIS APPEARS AS A VERY YOUNG 
 
 MAN INDEED ....... ..... 34 
 
 iv MRS. HALLER ............ 53 
 
 v MRS. HALLER AT HOME ......... 66 
 
 vi CONTAINS BOTH LOVE AND WAR ...... 87 
 
 vn IN WHICH THE MAJOR MAKES HIS APPEARANCE . . 105 
 
 vni IN WHICH PEN is KEPT WAITING AT THE DOOR, 
 WHILE THE READER is INFORMED WHO LITTLE 
 
 LAURA WAS ............. 117 
 
 ix IN WHICH THE MAJOR OPENS THE CAMPAIGN . . 135 
 
 x FACING THE ENEMY .......... 146 
 
 xi NEGOTIATION ............. 155 
 
 XH IN WHICH A SHOOTING MATCH is PROPOSED . . 169 
 MII A CRISIS .............. 
 
 XIV IN WHICH MlSS FOTHERINGAY MAKES A NfiW EN- 
 
 GAGEMENT ............. 195 
 
 xv THE HAPPY VILLAGE .......... 207 
 
 xvi WHICH CONCLUDES THE FIRST PART OF THIS 
 
 HISTORY .............. 224 
 
 xvii
 
 xviii CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PACiE 
 
 xvii ALMA MATER 250 
 
 xviii PENDENNIS OF BONIFACE 265 
 
 xix RAKE'S PROGRESS 286 
 
 xx FLIGHT AFTER DEFEAT . . :i . 298 
 
 xxi PRODIGAL'S RETURN 811 
 
 xxii NEW FACES . . '. . . . . .' ....'. . 825 
 
 xxiii A LITTLE INNOCENT . . . . . . ... . 352 
 
 xxiv CONTAINS BOTH LOVE AND JEALOUSY . . . . . 867 
 
 xxv A HOUSE FULL OF VISITORS 382 
 
 xxvi CONTAINS SOME BALL-PRACTISING 404 
 
 xxvii WHICH is BOTH QUARRELSOME AND SENTIMENTAL 418 
 
 xxvin BABYLON 441 
 
 xxix THE KNIGHTS OF THE TEMPLE 459 
 
 xxx OLD AND NEW ACQUAINTANCES 474 
 
 XXXI IN WHICH THE PRINTER'S DfiVIL COMES TO THE 
 
 DOOR . . . . . t . , . . . . . . . 493 
 
 \.\\n WHICH is PASSED IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF 
 
 LUDGATE HILL 513 
 
 XXXIII IN WHICH THE HlSTORY STILL HOVERS ABOUT 
 
 FLEET-STREET . . . . ..... . . 530 
 
 xxxiv A DINNER IN THE Row . . . 540 
 
 xxxv THE "PALL MALL GAZETTE" ....... 557 
 
 xxxvi WHERE PEN APPEARS IN TOWN AND COUNTRY . . 567 
 xxxvn IN WHICH THE SYLPH REAPPEARS 592 
 
 xxxvra IN WHICH COLONEL ALTAMONT APPEARS AND 
 
 DISAPPEARS . 605
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 BOEHM'S STATUETTE OF THACKERAY .... Frontispiece 
 
 FAC-SIMILES OF THE ORIGINAL TITLE-PAGES TO VOLUMES 
 
 I AND II OF PENDENNIS ix, xi 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 CALM SUMMER EVENINGS 18 
 
 YOUTH BETWEEN PLEASURE AND DUTY 60 
 
 THE CURATE COME TO GRIEF 64 
 
 A VlEW FROM THE DEAN*S GARDEN ........ 100 
 
 POOR PEN . . ; 110 
 
 THE GENERAL'S SALUTATION OF THE MAJOR 154 
 
 A CUT DIRECT 194 
 
 THE MANAGER FROM LONDON 198 
 
 "DOES ANY BODY WANT MORE?" 218 
 
 THE CURATE'S CONFIDANTE 232 
 
 PEN'S STAIRCASE 1. A LITTLE DINNER ....... 288 
 
 PEN'S STAIRCASE 2. A FEW LITTLE BILLS 296 
 
 MASTER FRANCIS IN A STATE OF REVOLT 844 
 
 MR. PEN BEGINS TO BE CONSOLED 348 
 
 xix
 
 xx LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 MlROBOLANT FASCINATES THE NATIVES 360 
 
 A MORNING VlSIT AT TEA-TIME 392 
 
 PEN PURSUING HIS LAW STUDIES 452 
 
 ARTHUR MEETS WITH AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE .... 456 
 
 AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE 480 
 
 THE "PALL MALL GAZETTE" 510 
 
 MRS. BUNGAY MOLLIFIED 536 
 
 PEN HEARS HIMSELF IN PRINT 564 
 
 COLONEL ALTAMONT REFUSES TO MOVE ON . . . . 612
 
 PENDENNIS
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 SHOWS HOW FIRST LOVE MAY INTERRUPT BREAKFAST 
 
 NE fine morning in the full Lon- 
 don season, Major Ar- 
 thur Pendennis came over 
 from his lodgings, ac- 
 cording to his custom, to 
 breakfast at a certain 
 Club in Pall Mall, of 
 which he was a chief or- 
 nament. At a quarter 
 past ten the Major inva- 
 riably made his appear- 
 ance in the best blacked 
 boots in all London, with 
 a checked morning cravat that never was rumpled until 
 dinner time, a buff waistcoat which bore the crown of his 
 sovereign on the buttons, and linen so spotless that Mr. 
 Brummel himself asked the name of his laundress, and 
 would probably have employed her had not misfortunes 
 compelled that great man to fly the country. Penden- 
 nis's coat, his white gloves, his whiskers, his very cane, 
 were perfect of their kind as specimens of the costume 
 of a military man en retraite. At a distance, or seeing 
 his back merely, you would have taken him to be not 
 more than thirty years old: it was only by a nearer in-
 
 2 PENDENNIS 
 
 spection that you saw the factitious nature of his rich 
 brown hair, and that there were a few crow's-feet round 
 about the somewhat faded eyes of his handsome mottled 
 face. His nose was of the Wellington pattern. His 
 hands and wristbands were beautifully long and white. 
 On the latter he wore handsome gold buttons given to 
 him by his Royal Highness the Duke of York, and on 
 the others more than one elegant ring, the chief and lar- 
 gest of them being emblazoned with the famous arms of 
 Pendennis. 
 
 He always took possession of the same table in the 
 same corner of the room, from which nobody ever now 
 
 f 
 
 thought of ousting him. One or two mad wags and 
 wild fellows had, in former days, endeavoured to de- 
 prive him of this place ; but there was a quiet dignity in 
 the Major's manner as he took his seat at the next table, 
 and surveyed the interlopers, which rendered it impos- 
 sible for any man to sit and breakfast under his eye ; and 
 that table by the fire, and yet near the window be- 
 came his own. His letters were laid out there in expec- 
 tation of his arrival, and many was the young fellow 
 about town who looked with wonder at the number of 
 those notes, and at the seals and franks which they bore. 
 If there was any question about etiquette, society, who 
 was married to whom, of what age such and such a duke 
 was, Pendennis was the man to whom every one ap- 
 pealed. Marchionesses used to drive up to the Club, and 
 leave notes for him, or fetch him out. He was perfectly 
 affable. The young men liked to walk with him in the 
 Park or down Pall Mall ; for he touched his hat to every- 
 body, and every other man he met was a lord. 
 
 The Major sate down at his accustomed table then, 
 and while the waiters went to bring him his toast and
 
 PENDENNIS 3 
 
 his hot newspaper, he surveyed his letters through his 
 gold double eye-glass, and examined one pretty note 
 after another, and laid them by in order. There were 
 large solemn dinner cards, suggestive of three courses 
 and heavy conversation; there were neat little confiden- 
 tial notes, conveying female entreaties ; there was a note 
 on thick official paper from the Marquis of Steyne, tell- 
 ing him to come to Richmond to a little party at the Star 
 and Garter ; and another from the Bishop of Baling and 
 Mrs. Trail, requesting the honour of Major Pendennis's 
 company at Ealing House, all of which letters Penden- 
 nis read gracefully, and with the more satisfaction, 
 because Glowry, the Scotch surgeon, breakfasting oppo- 
 site to him, was looking on, and hating him for having 
 so many invitations, which nobody ever sent to Glowry. 
 
 These perused, the Major took out his pocket-book 
 to see on what days he was disengaged, and which of 
 these many hospitable calls he could afford to accept or 
 decline. 
 
 He threw over Cutler, the East India Director, in 
 Baker Street, in order to dine with Lord Steyne and 
 the little French party at the Star and Garter the 
 Bishop he accepted, because, though the dinner was 
 slow, he liked to dine with bishops and so went through 
 his list and disposed of them according to his fancy or 
 interest. Then he took his breakfast and looked over 
 the paper, the gazette, the births and deaths, and the 
 fashionable intelligence, to see that his name was down 
 among the guests at my Lord So-and-so's fete, and in 
 the intervals of these occupations carried on cheerful 
 conversation with his acquaintances about the room. 
 
 Among the letters which formed Major Pendennis's 
 budget for that morning there was only one unread, and
 
 4 PENDENNIS 
 
 which lay solitary and apart from all the fashionable 
 London letters, with a country post-mark and a homely 
 seal. The superscription was in a pretty delicate female 
 hand, marked " immediate " by the fair writer; yet the 
 Major had, for reasons of his own, neglected up to the 
 present moment his humble rural petitioner, who to be 
 sure could hardly hope to get a hearing among so many 
 grand folks who attended his levee. The fact was, this 
 was a letter from a female relative of Pendennis, and 
 while the grandees of her brother's acquaintance were 
 received and got their interview, and drove off, as it 
 were, the patient country letter remained for a long time 
 waiting for an audience in the ante-chamber, under the 
 slop-basin. 
 
 At last it came to be this letter's turn, and the Major 
 broke a seal with " Fairoaks " engraved upon it, and 
 " Clavering St. Mary's " for a post-mark. It was a 
 double letter, and the Major commenced perusing the 
 envelope before he attacked the inner epistle. 
 
 " Is it a letter from another Jook" growled Mr. 
 Glowry, inwardly. " Pendennis would not be leaving 
 that to the last, I'm thinking." 
 
 " My dear Major Pendennis," the letter ran, " I beg 
 and implore you to come to me immediately " very 
 likely, thought Pendennis, and Steyne's dinner to-day 
 " I am in the greatest grief and perplexity. My 
 dearest boy, who has been hitherto everything the fond- 
 est mother could wish, is grieving me dreadfully. He 
 has formed I can hardly write it a passion, an infatu- 
 ation," the Major grinned " for an actress who has 
 been performing here. She is at least twelve years older 
 than Arthur who will not be eighteen till next Febru- 
 aryand the wretched boy insists upon marrying her."
 
 PENDENNIS 5 
 
 "Hay! What's making Pendennis swear now?" 
 Mr. Glowry asked of himself, for rage and wonder were 
 concentrated in the Major's open mouth, as he read this 
 astounding announcement. 
 
 " Do, my dear friend," the grief -stricken lady went 
 on, " come to me instantly on the receipt of this ; and, 
 as Arthur's guardian, entreat, command, the wretched 
 child to give up this most deplorable resolution." And, 
 after more entreaties to the above effect, the writer con- 
 cluded by signing herself the Major's " unhappy affec- 
 tionate sister, Helen Pendennis." 
 
 " Fairoaks, Tuesday " the Major concluded, read- 
 ing the last words of the letter " Ad d pretty busi- 
 ness at Fairoaks, Tuesday; now let us see what the boy 
 has to say ; " and he took the other letter, which was 
 written in a great floundering boy's hand, and sealed 
 with the large signet of the Pendennises, even larger 
 than the Major's own, and with supplementary wax 
 sputtered all round the seal, in token of the writer's 
 tremulousness and agitation. 
 
 The epistle ran thus 
 
 ** Fairoaks , Monday, Midnight. 
 " MY DEAR UNCLE, 
 
 " In informing you of my engagement with Miss Costigan, 
 daughter of J. Chesterfield Costigan, Esq., of Costiganstown, 
 but, perhaps, better known to you under her professional name 
 of Miss Fotheringay, of the Theatres Royal, Drury Lane and 
 Crow Street, and of the Norwich and Welsh Circuit, I am aware 
 that I make an announcement which cannot, according to the 
 present prejudices of society at least, be welcome to my family. 
 My dearest mother, on whom, God knows, I would wish to inflict 
 no needless pain, is deeply moved and grieved, I am sorry to say, 
 by the intelligence which I have this night conveyed to her. I
 
 6 PENDENNIS 
 
 beseech you, my dear Sir, to come down and reason with her and 
 console her. Although obliged by poverty to earn an honourable 
 maintenance by the exercise of her splendid talents, Miss Costi- 
 gan's family is as ancient and noble as our own. When our an- 
 cestor, Ralph Pendennis, landed with Richard II. in Ireland, 
 my Emily's forefathers were kings of that country. I have the 
 information from Mr. Costigan, who, like yourself, is a military 
 man. 
 
 " It is in vain I have attempted to argue with my dear mother, 
 and prove to her that a young lady of irreproachable character 
 and lineage, endowed with the most splendid gifts of beauty and 
 genius, who devotes herself to the exercise of one of the noblest 
 professions, for the sacred purpose of maintaining her family, is 
 a being whom we should all love and reverence, rather than avoid ; 
 my poor mother has prejudices which it is impossible for my 
 logic to overcome, and refuses to welcome to her arms one who is 
 disposed to be her most affectionate daughter through life. 
 
 " Although Miss Costigan is some years older than myself, 
 that circumstance does not operate as a barrier to my affection, 
 and I am sure will not influence its duration. A love like mine, 
 Sir, I feel, is contracted once and for ever. As I never had 
 dreamed of love until I saw her I feel now that I shall die with- 
 out ever knowing another passion. It is the fate of my life ; and 
 having loved once, I should despise myself, and be unworthy of 
 my name as a gentleman, if I hesitated to abide by my passion : 
 if I did not give all where I felt all, and endow the woman who 
 loves me fondly with my whole heart and my whole fortune. 
 
 " I press for a speedy marriage with my Emily for why, in 
 truth, should it be delayed? A delay implies a doubt, which I 
 cast from me as unworthy. It is impossible that my sentiments 
 can change towards Emily that at any age she can be anything 
 but the sole object of my love. Why, then, wait? I entreat you, 
 my dear Uncle, to come down and reconcile my dear mother to 
 our union, and I address you as a man of the world, qui mores 
 hominum multorum vidit et urbet, who will not feel any of the
 
 PENDENNIS 7 
 
 weak scruples and fears which agitate a lady who has scarcely 
 ever left her village. 
 
 " Pray, come down to us immediately. I am quite confident 
 that apart from considerations of fortune you will admire and 
 approve of my Emily. "Your affectionate Nephew, 
 
 "ARTHUR PENDENNIS, JR." 
 
 When the Major had concluded the perusal of this 
 letter, his countenance assumed an expression of such 
 rage and horror that Glowry, the surgeon, felt in his 
 pocket for his lancet, which he always carried in his card- 
 case, and thought his respected friend was going into a 
 fit. The intelligence was indeed sufficient to agitate 
 Pendennis. The head of the Pendennises going to 
 marry an actress ten years his senior, the head-strong 
 boy about to plunge into matrimony. ' The mother has 
 spoiled the young rascal," groaned the Major inwardly, 
 " with her cursed sentimentality and romantic rubbish. 
 My nephew marry a tragedy queen! Gracious mercy, 
 people will laugh at me so that I shall not dare show 
 my head! " And he thought with an inexpressible pang 
 that he must give up Lord Steyne's dinner at Richmond, 
 and must lose his rest and pass the night in an abomi- 
 nable tight mail-coach, instead of taking pleasure, as he 
 had promised himself, in some of the most agreeable and 
 select society in England. 
 
 He quitted his breakfast-table for the adjoining 
 writing-room, and there ruefully wrote off refusals to 
 the Marquis, the Earl, the Bishop, and all his entertain- 
 ers ; and he ordered his servant to take places in the mail- 
 coach for that evening, of course charging the sum 
 which he disbursed for the seats to the account of the 
 widow and the young scapegrace of whom he was 
 guardian.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 A PEDIGREE AND OTHER FAMILY MATTERS 
 
 AHLY in the Regency 
 of George the Mag- 
 nificent, there lived 
 in a small town in 
 the west of Eng- 
 land, called Claver- 
 ing, a gentleman whose 
 name was Pendennis. 
 There were those alive 
 who remembered hav- 
 ing seen his name 
 painted on a board, 
 which was surmount- 
 ed by a gilt pestle and 
 mortar over the door 
 of a very humble lit- 
 tle shop in the city 
 of Bath, where Mr. 
 
 Pendennis exercised the profession of apothecary and 
 surgeon; and where he not only attended gentlemen 
 in their sick-rooms, and ladies at the most interesting 
 periods of their lives, but would condescend to sell 
 a brown-paper plaster to a farmer's wife across the 
 counter, or to vend tooth-brushes, hair-powder, and 
 London perfumery. 
 
 And yet that little apothecary who sold a stray cus-
 
 PENDENNIS 9 
 
 tomer a pennyworth of salts, or a more fragrant cake of 
 Windsor soap, was a gentleman of good education, and 
 of as old a family as any in the whole county of Somer- 
 set. He had a Cornish pedigree which carried the Pen- 
 dennises up to the time of the Druids, and who knows 
 how much farther back? They had intermarried with 
 the Normans at a very late period of their family ex- 
 istence, and they were related to all the great families 
 of Wales and Brittany. Pendennis had had a piece of 
 University education too, and might have pursued that 
 career with honour, but in his second year at Oxbridge 
 his father died insolvent, and poor Pen was obliged to 
 betake himself to the pestle and apron. He always de- 
 tested the trade, and it was only necessity, and the offer 
 of his mother's brother, a London apothecary of low 
 family, into which Pendennis's father had demeaned 
 himself by marrying, that forced John Pendennis into 
 so odious a calling. 
 
 He quickly after his apprenticeship parted from the 
 coarse-minded practitioner his relative, and set up for 
 himself at Bath with his modest medical ensign. He 
 had for some time a hard struggle with poverty; and it 
 was all he could do to keep the shop in decent repair, 
 and his bed-ridden mother in comfort: but Lady Rib- 
 stone happening to be passing to the Rooms with an in- 
 toxicated Irish chairman who bumped her ladyship 
 up against Pen's very door-post, and drove his chair- 
 pole through the handsomest pink-bottle in the sur- 
 geon's window, alighted screaming from her vehicle, 
 and was accommodated with a chair in Mr. Pendennis's 
 shop, where she was brought round with cinnamon and 
 sal-volatile. 
 
 Mr. Pendennis's manners were so uncommonly gen-
 
 10 PENDENNIS 
 
 tlemanlike and soothing, that her ladyship, the wife of 
 Sir Pepin Ribstone, of Codlingbury, in the county of 
 Somerset, Bart., appointed her preserver, as she called 
 him, apothecary to her person and family, which was 
 very large. Master Ribstone coming home for the 
 Christmas holidays from Eton, over-ate himself and had 
 a fever, in which Mr. Pendennis treated him with the 
 greatest skill and tenderness. In a word, he got the 
 good graces of the Codlingbury family, and from that 
 day began to prosper. The good company of Bath 
 patronised him, and amongst the ladies especially he 
 was beloved and admired. First his humble little shop 
 became a smart one: then he discarded the selling of 
 tooth-brushes and perfumery: then he shut up the shop 
 altogether, and only had a little surgery attended by a 
 genteel young man: then he had a gig with a man to 
 drive him ; and, before her exit from this world, his poor 
 old mother had the happiness of seeing from her bed- 
 room window, to which her chair was rolled, her beloved 
 John step into a close carriage of his own, a one-horse 
 carriage it is true, but with the arms of the family 
 of Pendennis handsomely emblazoned on the panels. 
 " What would Arthur say now? " she asked, speaking 
 of a younger son of hers " who never so much as once 
 came to see my dearest Johnny through all the time of 
 his poverty and struggles ! " 
 
 " Captain Pendennis is with his regiment in India, 
 mother," Mr. Pendennis remarked, " and, if you please, 
 I wish you would not call me Johnny before the young 
 man before Mr. Parkins." 
 
 Presently the day came when she ceased to call her 
 son by any title of endearment or affection; and his 
 house was very lonely without that kind though queru-
 
 PENDENNIS 11 
 
 lous voice. He had his night-bell altered and placed in 
 the room in which the good old lady had grumbled for 
 many a long year, and he slept in the great large bed 
 there. He was upwards of forty years old when these 
 events befel: before the war was over; before George 
 the Magnificent came to the throne; before this history 
 indeed: but what is a gentleman without his pedigree? 
 Pendennis, by this time, had his handsomely framed and 
 glazed, and hanging up in his drawing-room between 
 the pictures of Codlingbury House in Somersetshire, 
 and St. Boniface's College, Oxbridge, where he had 
 passed the brief and happy days of his early manhood. 
 As for the pedigree, he had taken it out of a trunk, as 
 Sterne's officer called for his sword, now that he was a 
 gentleman and could show it. 
 
 About the time of Mrs. Pendennis's demise, another 
 of her son's patients likewise died at Bath ; that virtuous 
 old woman, old Lady Pontypool, daughter of Reginald 
 twelfth Earl of Bareacres, and by consequence great- 
 grand-aunt to the present Earl, and widow of John 
 second Lord Pontypool, and likewise of the Reverend 
 Jonas Wales, of the Armageddon Chapel, Clifton. 
 For the last five years of her life her ladyship had been 
 attended by Miss Helen Thistlewood, a very distant 
 relative of the noble house of Bareacres, before men- 
 tioned, and daughter of Lieutenant R. Thistlewood, 
 R. N., killed at the battle of Copenhagen. Under Lady 
 Pontypool's roof Miss Thistlewood found a shelter : the 
 Doctor, who paid his visits to my Lady Pontypool at 
 least twice a day, could not but remark the angelical 
 sweetness and kindness with which the young lady bore 
 her elderly relative's ill-temper ; and it was as they were 
 going in the fourth mourning coaeh to attend her lady-
 
 12 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 ship's venerated remains to Bath Abbey, where they 
 now repose, that he looked at her sweet pale face and 
 resolved upon putting a certain question to her, the very 
 nature of which made his pulse beat ninety, at least. 
 He was older than she by more than twenty years, and 
 
 at no time the most ardent of men. Perhaps he had had 
 a love affair in early life which he had to strangle per- 
 haps all early love affairs ought to be strangled or 
 drowned, like so many blind kittens: well, at three-and- 
 forty he was a collected quiet little gentleman in black 
 stockings with a bald head, and a few days after the 
 ceremony he called to see her, and, as he felt her pulse,
 
 PENDENNIS 13 
 
 he kept hold of her hand in his, and asked her where she 
 was going to live now that the Pontypool family had 
 come down upon the property, which was being nailed 
 into boxes, and packed into hampers, and swaddled up 
 with haybands, and buried in straw, and locked under 
 three keys in green-baize plate-chests, and carted away 
 under the eyes of poor Miss Helen, he asked her where 
 she was going to live finally. 
 
 Her eyes filled with tears, and she said she did not 
 know. She had a little money. The old lady had left 
 her a thousand pounds, indeed; and she would go into 
 a boarding-house or into a school: in fine, she did not 
 know where. 
 
 Then Pendennis, looking into her pale face, and keep- 
 ing hold of her cold little hand, asked her if she would 
 come and live with him? He was old compared to to 
 so blooming a young lady as Miss Thistlewood (Pen- 
 dennis was of the grave old complimentary school of 
 gentlemen and apothecaries), but he was of good birth, 
 and, he flattered himself, of good principles and temper. 
 His prospects were good, and daily mending. He was 
 alone in the world, and had need of a kind and constant 
 companion, whom it would be the study of his life to 
 make happy ; in a word, he recited to her a little speech, 
 which he had composed that morning in bed, and re- 
 hearsed and perfected in his carriage, as he was coming 
 to wait upon the young lady. 
 
 Perhaps if he had had an early love-passage, she too 
 had one day hoped for a different lot than to be wedded 
 to a little gentleman who rapped his teeth and smiled 
 artificially, who was laboriously polite to the butler as 
 he slid up stairs into the drawing-room, and profusely 
 civil to the lady's-maid, who waited at the bed-room
 
 14 PENDENNIS 
 
 door; for whom her old patroness used to ring as for a 
 servant, and who came with even more eagerness; per- 
 haps she would have chosen a different man but she 
 knew, on the other hand, how worthy Pendennis was, 
 how prudent, how honourable; how good he had been 
 to his mother, and constant in his care of her; and the 
 upshot of this interview was, that she, blushing very 
 much, made Pendennis an extremely low curtsey, and 
 asked leave to to consider his very kind proposal. 
 
 They were married in the dull Bath season, which was 
 the height of the season in London. And Pendennis 
 having previously, through a professional friend, 
 M.R.C.S., secured lodgings in Holies Street, Cavendish 
 Square, took his wife thither in a chaise and pair; con- 
 ducted her to the theatres, the Parks, and the Chapel 
 Royal; showed her the folks going to a Drawing-room, 
 and, in a word, gave her all the pleasures of the town. 
 He likewise left cards upon Lord Pontypool, upon the 
 Right Honourable the Earl of Bareacres, and upon Sir 
 Pepin and Lady Ribstone, his earliest and kindest pa- 
 trons. Bareacres took no notice of the cards. Ponty- 
 pool called, admired Mrs. Pendennis, and said Lady 
 Pontypool would come and see her, which her ladyship 
 did, per proxy of John her footman, who brought her 
 card, and an invitation to a concert five weeks off. Pen- 
 dennis was back in his little one-horse carriage, dispens- 
 ing draughts and pills, at that time: but the Ribstones 
 asked him and Mrs. Pendennis to an entertainment, 
 of which Mr. Pendennis talked to the last day of his life. 
 
 The secret ambition of Mr. Pendennis had always 
 been to be a gentleman. It takes much time and careful 
 saving for a provincial doctor, whose gains are not very
 
 PENDENNIS 15 
 
 large, to lay by enough money wherewith to purchase a 
 house and land: but besides our friend's own frugality 
 and prudence, fortune aided him considerably in his 
 endeavour, and brought him to the point which he so 
 panted to attain. He laid out some money very advan- 
 tageously in the purchase of a house and small estate 
 close upon the village of Clavering before mentioned. 
 A lucky purchase which he had made of shares in a 
 copper-mine added very considerably to his wealth, and 
 he realised with great prudence while this mine was still 
 at its full vogue. Finally, he sold his business, at Bath, 
 to Mr. Parkins, for a handsome sum of ready money, 
 and for an annuity to be paid to him during a certain 
 number of years after he had for ever retired from the 
 handling of the mortar and pestle. 
 
 Arthur Pendennis, his son, was eight years old at the 
 time of this event, so that it is no wonder that the lad, 
 who left Bath and the surgery so young, should forget 
 the existence of such a place almost entirely, and that 
 his father's hands had ever been dirtied by the com- 
 pounding of odious pills, or the preparation of filthy 
 plasters. The old man never spoke about the shop him- 
 self, never alluded to it; called in the medical practi- 
 tioner of Clavering to attend his family ; sunk the black 
 breeches and stockings altogether; attended market and 
 sessions, and wore a bottle-green coat and brass buttons 
 with drab gaiters, just as if he had been an English gen- 
 tleman all his life*. He used to stand at his lodge-gate, 
 and see the coaches come in, and bow gravely to the 
 guards and coachmen as they touched their hats and 
 drove by. It was he who founded the Clavering Book 
 Club: and set up the Samaritan Soup and Blanket So- 
 ciety. It was he who brought the mail, which used to
 
 16 PENDENNIS 
 
 run through Cacklefield before, away from that village 
 and through Clavering. At church he was equally active 
 as a vestryman and a worshipper. At market every 
 Thursday, he went from pen to stall; looked at samples 
 of oats, and munched corn; felt beasts, punched geese 
 in the breast, and weighed them with a knowing air ; and 
 did business with the farmers at the Clavering Arms, 
 as well as the oldest frequenter of that house of call. 
 It was now his shame, as it formerly was his pride, to be 
 called doctor, and those who wished to please him always 
 gave him the title of Squire. 
 
 Heaven knows where they came from, but a whole 
 range of Pendennis portraits presently hung round the 
 Doctor's oak dining-room; Lelys and Vandykes he 
 vowed all the portraits to be, and when questioned as 
 to the history of the originals, would vaguely say they 
 were " ancestors of his." His little boy believed in them 
 to their fullest extent, and Roger Pendennis of Agin- 
 court, Arthur Pendennis of Crecy, General Pendennis 
 of Blenheim and Oudenarde, were as real and actual 
 beings for this young gentleman as whom shall we 
 say? as Robinson Crusoe, or Peter Wilkins, or the 
 Seven Champions of Christendom, whose histories were 
 in his library. 
 
 Pendennis's fortune, which was not above eight hun- 
 dred pounds a year, did not, with the best economy and 
 management, permit of his living with the great folks 
 of the county; but he had a decent comfortable society 
 of the second sort. If they were not the roses, they lived 
 near the roses, as it were, and had a good deal of the 
 odour of genteel life. They had out their plate, and 
 dined each other round in the moonlight nights twice 
 a year, coming a dozen miles to these festivals; and
 
 PENDENNIS 17 
 
 besides the county, the Pendennises had the society of 
 the town of Clavering, as much as, nay, more than they 
 liked : for Mrs. Pybus was always poking about Helen's 
 conservatories, and intercepting the operation of her 
 soup-tickets and coal-clubs: Captain Glanders (H. P., 
 50th Dragoon Guards) was for ever swaggering about 
 the Squire's stables and gardens, and endeavouring to 
 enlist him in his quarrels with the Vicar, with the Post- 
 master, with the Reverend F. Wapshot of Clavering 
 Grammar School, for overflogging his son, Anglesea 
 Glanders, with all the village in fine. And Pendennis 
 and his wife often blessed themselves, that their house 
 of Fairoaks was nearly a mile out of Clavering, or their 
 premises would never have been free from the prying 
 eyes and prattle of one or other of the male and female 
 inhabitants there. 
 
 Fairoaks lawn comes down to the little river Brawl, 
 and on the other side were the plantations and woods ( as 
 much as were left of them) of Clavering Park, Sir 
 Francis Clavering, Bart. The park was let out in pas- 
 ture and fed down by sheep and cattle when the Pen- 
 dennises came first to live at Fairoaks. Shutters were 
 up in the house ; a splendid freestone palace, with great 
 stairs, statues, and porticos, whereof you may see a pic- 
 ture in the " Beauties of England and Wales." Sir 
 Richard Clavering, Sir Francis's grandfather, had 
 commenced the ruin of the family by the building of 
 this palace : his successor had achieved the ruin by living 
 in it. The present Sir Francis was abroad somewhere; 
 nor could anybody be found rich enough to rent that 
 enormous mansion, through the deserted rooms, mouldy 
 clanking halls, and dismal galleries of which, Arthur 
 Pendennis many a time walked trembling when he was
 
 18 PENDENNIS 
 
 a boy. At sunset, from the lawn of Fairoaks, there was 
 a pretty sight: it and the opposite park of Clavering 
 were in the habit of putting on a rich golden tinge, 
 which became them both wonderfully. The upper win- 
 dows of the great house flamed so as to make your eyes 
 wink; the little river ran off noisily westward, and was 
 lost in a sombre wood, behind which the towers of the old 
 abbey church of Clavering (whereby that town is called 
 Clavering St. Mary's to the present day) rose up in 
 purple splendour. Little Arthur's figure and his mo- 
 ther's cast long blue shadows over the grass: and he 
 would repeat in a low voice ( for a scene of great natural 
 beauty always moved the boy, who inherited this sen- 
 sibility from his mother) certain lines beginning, "These 
 are thy glorious works, Parent of Good; Almighty! 
 thine this universal frame," greatly to Mrs. Penden- 
 nis's delight. Such walks and conversation generally 
 ended in a profusion of filial and maternal embraces ; for 
 to love and to pray were the main occupations of this 
 dear woman's life; and I have often heard Pendennis 
 say in his wild way, that he felt that he was sure of going 
 to heaven, for his mother never could be happy there 
 without him. . 
 
 As for John Pendennis, as the father of the family, 
 and that sort of thing, everybody had the greatest re- 
 spect for him: and his orders were obeyed like those of 
 the Medes and Persians. His hat was as well brushed, 
 perhaps, as that of any man in this empire. His meals 
 were served at the same minute every day, and woe to 
 those who came late, as little Pen, a disorderly little ras- 
 cal, sometimes did. Prayers were recited, his letters 
 were read, his business dispatched, his stables and gar- 
 den inspected, his hen-houses and kennel, his barn and
 
 Calm Summer Evenings
 
 PENDENNIS 19 
 
 pigstye visited, always at regular hours. After dinner 
 he always had a nap with the Globe newspaper on his 
 knee, and his yellow bandanna handkerchief on his face 
 (Major Pendennis sent the yellow handkerchiefs from 
 India, and his brother had helped in the purchase of 
 his majority, so that they were good friends now) . And 
 so, as his dinner took place at six o'clock to a minute, 
 and the sunset business alluded to may be supposed to 
 have occurred at about half -past seven, it is probable 
 that he did not much care for the view in front of his 
 lawn windows, or take any share in the poetry and 
 caresses which were taking place there. 
 
 They seldom occurred in his presence. However 
 frisky they were before, mother and child were hushed 
 and quiet when Mr. Pendennis walked into the draw- 
 ing-room, his newspaper under his arm. . . And here, 
 while little Pen, buried in a great chair, read all the 
 books of which he could lay hold, the Squire perused his 
 own articles in the " Gardener's Gazette," or took a 
 solemn hand at picquet with Mrs. Pendennis, or an occa- 
 sional friend from the village. 
 
 Pendennis usually took care that at least one of his 
 grand dinners should take place when his brother, the 
 Major, who, on the return of his regiment from India 
 and New South Wales, had sold out and gone upon 
 half -pay, came to pay his biennial visit to Fairoaks. 
 " My brother, Major Pendennis," was a constant theme 
 of the retired Doctor's conversation. All the family 
 delighted in my brother the Major. He was the link 
 which bound them to the great world of London, and 
 the fashion. He always brought down the last news of 
 the nobility, and spoke of such with soldier-like respect
 
 20 PENDENNIS 
 
 and decorum. He would say, " My Lord Bareacres has 
 been good enough to invite me to Bareacres for the 
 pheasant shooting," or,." My Lord Steyne is so kind as 
 to wish for my presence at Stillbrook for the Easter 
 holidays; " and you may be sure the whereabouts of my 
 brother the Major was carefully made known by worthy 
 Mr. Pendennis to his friends at the Clavering Reading- 
 room, at Justice-meetings, or at the County-town. 
 Their carriages would come from ten miles round to call 
 upon Major Pendennis in his visits to Fairoaks; the 
 fame of his fashion as a man about town was established 
 throughout the county. There was a talk of his marry- 
 ing Miss Hunkle, of Lilybank, old Hunkle the Attor- 
 ney's daughter, with at least fifteen hundred a-year to 
 her fortune; but my brother the Major declined. " As 
 a bachelor," he said, " nobody cares how poor I am. I 
 have the happiness to live with people who are so highly 
 placed in the world, that a few hundreds or thousands 
 a year more or less can make no difference in the esti- 
 mation in which they are pleased to hold me. Miss 
 Hunkle, though a most respectable lady, is not in pos- 
 session of either the birth or the manners which would 
 entitle her to be received into the sphere in which I 
 have the honour to move. I shall live and die an old 
 bachelor, John: and your worthy friend, Miss Hunkle, 
 I have no doubt, will find some more worthy object of 
 her affection, than a worn-out old soldier on half-pay." 
 Time showed the correctness of the surmise ; Miss Hun- 
 kle married a young French nobleman, and is now at 
 this moment living at Lilybank, under the title of Bar- 
 oness de Carambole, having been separated from her 
 wild young scapegrace of a Baron very shortly after 
 their union.
 
 PENDENNIS 21 
 
 The Major had a sincere liking and regard for his 
 sister-in-law, whom he pronounced, and with perfect 
 truth, to be as fine a lady as any in England. Indeed, 
 Mrs. Pendennis's tranquil beauty, her natural sweet- 
 ness and kindness, and that simplicity and dignity which 
 a perfect purity and innocence are sure to bestow upon a 
 handsome woman, rendered her quite worthy of her 
 brother's praises. I think it is not national prejudice 
 which makes me believe that a high-bred English lady 
 is the most complete of all Heaven's subjects in this 
 world. In whom else do you see so much grace, and so 
 much virtue; so much faith, and so much tenderness; 
 with such a perfect refinement and chastity? And by 
 high-bred ladies I don't mean duchesses and countesses. 
 Be they ever so high in station, they can be but ladies, 
 and no more. But almost every man who lives in the 
 world has the happiness, let us hope, of counting a few 
 such persons amongst his circle of acquaintance 
 women in whose angelical natures there is something 
 awful, as well as beautiful, to contemplate; at whose 
 feet the wildest and fiercest of us must fall down and 
 humble ourselves, in admiration of that adorable purity 
 which never seems to do or to think wrong. 
 
 Arthur Pendennis had the good fortune to have such 
 a mother. During his childhood and youth, the boy 
 thought of her as little less than an angel a super- 
 natural being, all wisdom, love, and beauty. When her 
 husband drove her into the county town, to the assize 
 balls or concerts, he would step into the assembly with 
 his wife on his arm, and look the great folks in the face, 
 as much as to say, " Look at that, my lord ; can any of 
 you show me a woman like that? " She enraged some 
 country ladies with three times her money, by a sort of
 
 22 PENDENNIS 
 
 desperate perfection which they found in her. Miss 
 Pybus said she was cold and haughty ; Miss Pierce, that 
 she was too proud for her station; Mrs. Wapshot, as a 
 doctor of divinity's lady, would have the pas of her, who 
 was only the wife of a medical practitioner. In the 
 meanwhile, this lady moved through the world quite re- 
 gardless of all the comments that were made in 
 her praise or disfavour. She did not seem to know 
 that she was admired or hated for being so perfect ; but 
 carried on calmly through life, saying her prayers, 
 loving her family, helping her neighbours, and doing 
 her duty. 
 
 That even a woman should be faultless, however, is 
 an, arrangement not permitted by nature, which assigns 
 to us mental defects, as it awards to us headaches, ill- 
 nesses, or death: without which the scheme of the world 
 could not be carried on, nay, some of the best qualities 
 of mankind could not be brought into exercise. As pain 
 produces or elicits fortitude and endurance; difficulty, 
 perseverance; poverty, industry and ingenuity; danger, 
 courage and what not; so the very virtues, on the other 
 hand, will generate some vices; and, in fine, Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis had that vice which Miss Pybus and Miss Pierce 
 discovered in her, namely, that of pride; which did not 
 vest itself so much in her own person, as in that of her 
 family. She spoke about Mr. Pendennis (a worthy lit- 
 tle gentleman enough, but there are others as good as 
 he) with an awful reverence, as if he had been the Pope 
 of Rome on his throne, and she a cardinal kneeling at 
 his feet, and giving him incense. The Major she held 
 to be a sort of Bayard among Majors: and as for her son 
 Arthur she worshipped that youth with an ardour which 
 the young scapegrace accepted almost as coolly as the
 
 PENDENNIS 23 
 
 statue of the Saint in Saint Peter's receives the raptur- 
 ous osculations which the faithful deliver on his toe. 
 
 This unfortunate superstition and idol-worship of 
 this good woman was the cause of a great deal of the 
 misfortune which befel the young gentleman who is 
 the hero of this history, and deserves therefore to be 
 mentioned at the outset of his story. 
 
 Arthur Pendennis's schoolfellows at the Grey Friars 
 School state that, as a boy, he was in no ways remarkable 
 either as a dunce or as a scholar. He never read to im- 
 prove himself out of school-hours, but, on the contrary, 
 devoured all the novels, plays, and poetry, on which he 
 could lay his hands. He never was flogged, but it was 
 a wonder how he escaped the whipping-post. When he 
 had money he spent it royally in tarts for himself and 
 his friends ; he has been known to disburse nine and six- 
 pence out of ten shillings awarded to him in a single 
 day. When he had no funds he went on tick. When 
 he could get no credit he went without, and was almost 
 as happy. He has been known to take a thrashing for 
 a crony without saying a word ; but a blow, ever so slight, 
 from a friend, would make him roar. To fighting he 
 was averse from his earliest youth, as indeed to physic, 
 the Greek Grammar, or any other exertion, and would 
 engage in none of them, except at the last extremity. 
 He seldom if ever told lies, and never bullied little boys. 
 Those masters or seniors who were kind to him, he loved 
 with boyish ardour. And though the Doctor, when he 
 did not know his Horace, or could not construe his 
 Greek play, said that that boy Pendennis was a disgrace 
 to the school, a candidate for ruin in this world, and 
 perdition in the next ; a profligate who would most likely 
 bring his venerable father to ruiji and his mother to a
 
 24 PEXDENNIS 
 
 dishonoured grave, and the like yet as the Doctor 
 made use of these compliments to most of the boys in 
 the place (which has not turned out an unusual number 
 of felons and pickpockets), little Pen, at first uneasy 
 and terrified by these charges, became gradually accus- 
 tomed to hear them ; and he has not, in fact, either mur- 
 dered his parents, or committed any act worthy of 
 transportation or hanging up to the present day. 
 
 There were many of the upper boys, among the Cis- 
 tercians with whom Pendennis was educated, who as- 
 sumed all the privileges of men long before they quitted 
 that seminary. Many of them, for example, smoked 
 cigars and some had already begun the practice of in- 
 ebriation. One had fought a duel with an Ensign in a 
 marching regiment in consequence of a row at the thea- 
 tre another actually kept a buggy and horse at a livery 
 stable in Covent Garden, and might be seen driving 
 any Sunday in Hyde Park with a groom with squared 
 arms and armorial buttons by his side. Many of the 
 seniors were in love, and showed each other in confi- 
 dence poems addressed to, or letters and locks of hair 
 received from, young ladies but Pen, a modest and 
 timid youth, rather envied these than imitated them as 
 yet. He had not got beyond the theory as yet the 
 practice of life was all to come. And by the way, ye 
 tender mothers and sober fathers of Christian families, 
 a prodigious thing that theory of life is as orally 
 learned at a great public school. Why, if you could 
 hear those boys of fourteen who blush before mothers 
 and sneak off in silence in the presence of their daugh- 
 ters, talking among each other it would be the wo- 
 man's turn to blush then. Before he was twelve years 
 old little Pen had heard talk enough to make him quite
 
 PENDENNIS 25 
 
 awfully wise upon certain points and so, Madam, has 
 your pretty little rosy-cheeked son, who is coming home 
 from school for the ensuing holidays. I don't say that 
 the boy is lost, or that the innocence has left him which 
 he had from " Heaven, which is our home," but that the 
 shades of the prison-house are closing very fast over 
 him, and that we are helping as much as possible to cor- 
 rupt him. 
 
 Well Pen had just made his public appearance in a 
 coat with a tail, or cauda-virilis, and was looking most 
 anxiously in his little study-glass to see if his whiskers 
 were growing, like those of more fortunate youths his 
 companions; and, instead of the treble voice with which 
 he used to speak and sing (for his singing voice was a 
 very sweet one, and he used when little to be made to 
 perform " Home, sweet Home," " My pretty Page," 
 and a French song or two which his mother had taught 
 him, and other ballads for the delectation of the senior 
 boys), had suddenly plunged into a deep bass diversi- 
 fied by a squeak, which set master and scholars laughing 
 he was about sixteen years old in a word, when he was 
 suddenly called away from his academic studies. 
 
 It was at the close of the forenoon school, and Pen 
 had been unnoticed all the previous part of the morning 
 till now, when the Doctor put him on to construe in a 
 Greek play. He did not know a word of it, though lit- 
 tle Timmins, his form-fellow, was prompting him with 
 all his might. Pen had made a sad blunder or two 
 when the awful chief broke out upon him. 
 
 " Pendennis, sir," he said, " your idleness is incorri- 
 gible and your stupidity beyond example. You are a 
 disgrace to your school, and to your family, and I have 
 no doubt will prove so in after-life to your country. If
 
 26 PENDENNIS 
 
 that vice, sir, which is described to us as the root of all 
 evil, be really what moralists have represented (and I 
 have no doubt of the correctness of their opinion ) , for 
 what a prodigious quantity of future crime and wicked- 
 ness are you, unhappy boy, laying the seed! Miserable 
 trifler! A boy who construes 8e and, instead of 8e but, 
 at sixteen years of age, is guilty not merely of folly, 
 and ignorance, and dullness inconceivable, but of crime, 
 of deadly crime, of filial ingratitude, which I tremble 
 to contemplate. A boy, sir, who does not learn his 
 Greek play cheats the parent who spends money for his 
 education. A boy who cheats his parent is not very far 
 from robbing or forging upon his neighbour. A man 
 who forges on his neighbour pays the penalty of his 
 crime at the gallows. And it is not such a one that I 
 pity (for he will be deservedly cut off) ; but his mad- 
 dened and heart-broken parents, who are driven to a 
 premature grave by his crimes, or, if they live, drag on 
 a wretched and dishonoured old age. Go on, sir, and 
 I warn you that the very next mistake that you make 
 shall subject you to the punishment of the rod. Who's 
 that laughing? What ill-conditioned boy is there that 
 dares to laugh ? " shouted the Doctor. 
 
 Indeed, while the master was making this oration, 
 there was a general titter behind him in the school-room. 
 The orator had his back to the door of this ancient apart- 
 ment, which was open, and a gentleman who was quite 
 familiar with the place, for both Major Arthur and Mr. 
 John Pendennis had been at the school, was asking the 
 fifth-form boy who sat by the door for Pendennis. The 
 lad grinning pointed to the culprit against whom the 
 Doctor was pouring out the thunders of his just wrath 
 Major Pendennis could not help laughing. He re-
 
 PENDENNIS 27 
 
 membered having stood under that very pillar where 
 Pen the younger now stood, and having been assaulted 
 by the Doctor's predecessor years and years ago. The 
 intelligence was " passed round " that it was Pendennis's 
 uncle in an instant, and a hundred young faces wonder- 
 
 ing and giggling, between terror and laughter, turned 
 now to the new comer and then to the awful Doctor. 
 
 The Major asked the fifth-form boy to carry his card 
 up to the Doctor, which the lad did with an arch look. 
 Major Pendennis had written on the card, " I must take 
 A. P. home; his father is very ill." 
 
 As the Doctor received the card, and stopped his ha- 
 rangue with rather a scared look, the laughter of the 
 boys, half constrained until then, burst out in a general 
 shout. "Silence!" roared out the Doctor, stamping 
 with his foot. Pen looked up arid saw who was his de-
 
 28 PENDENNIS 
 
 liverer; the Major beckoned to him gravely, and tum- 
 bling down his books, Pen went across. 
 
 The Doctor took out his watch. It was two minutes 
 to one. ' We will take the Juvenal at afternoon 
 school," he said, nodding to the Captain, and all the 
 boys understanding the signal gathered up their books 
 and poured out of the hall. 
 
 Young Pen saw by his uncle's face that something 
 had happened at home. " Is there anything the matter 
 with my mother? " he said. He could hardly speak, 
 though, for emotion, and the tears which were ready to 
 start. 
 
 " No," said the Major, " but your father's very ill. 
 Go and pack your trunk directly; I have got a post- 
 chaise at the gate." 
 
 Pen went off quickly to his boarding-house to do as 
 his uncle bade him; and the Doctor, now left alone in 
 the school-room, came out to shake hands with his old 
 schoolfellow. You would not have thought it was the 
 same man. As Cinderella at a particular hour became, 
 from a blazing and magnificent princess, quite an ordi- 
 nary little maid in a grey petticoat, so, as the clock 
 struck one, all the thundering majesty and awful wrath 
 of the schoolmaster disappeared. 
 
 " There is nothing serious, I hope," said the Doctor. 
 " It is a pity to take the boy otherwise. He is a good 
 boy, rather idle and unenergetic, but an honest gentle- 
 manlike little fellow, though I can't get him to construe 
 as I wish. Won't you come in and have some luncheon? 
 My wife will be very happy to see you." 
 
 But Major Pendennis declined the luncheon. He 
 said his brother was very ill, had had a fit the day before, 
 and it was a great question if they should see him alive.
 
 PENDENNIS 29 
 
 * There's no other son, is there? " said the Doctor. 
 The Major answered " No." 
 
 " And there's a good eh a good eh property, I be- 
 lieve? " asked the other in an off-hand way. 
 
 " H'm so so," said the Major. Whereupon this col- 
 loquy came to an end. And Arthur Pendennis got into 
 a post-chaise with his uncle, never to come back to school 
 any more. 
 
 As the chaise drove through Clavering, the ostler 
 standing whistling under the archway of the Clavering 
 Arms, winked to the postilion ominously, as much as to 
 say all was over. The gardener's wife came and opened 
 the lodge-gates, and let the travellers through with a 
 silent shake of the head. All the blinds were down at 
 Fairoaks the face of the old footman was as blank 
 when he let them in. Arthur's face was white too, with 
 terror more than with grief. Whatever of warmth and 
 love the deceased man might have had, and he adored his 
 wife and loved and admired his son with all his heart, he 
 had shut them up within himself; nor had the boy been 
 ever able to penetrate that frigid outward barrier. But 
 Arthur had been his father's pride and glory through 
 life, and his name the last which John Pendennis had 
 tried to articulate whilst he lay with his wife's hand 
 clasping his own cold and clammy palm, as the flickering 
 spirit went out into the darkness of death, and life and 
 the world passed away from him. 
 
 The little girl, whose face had peered for a moment 
 under the blinds as the chaise came up, opened the door 
 from the stairs into the hall, and taking Arthur's hand 
 silently as he stooped down to kiss her, led him up stairs 
 to his mother. Old John opened the dining-room for 
 the Major. The room was darkened with the blinds
 
 30 PENDENNIS 
 
 down, and surrounded by all the gloomy pictures of the 
 Pendennises. He drank a glass of wine. The bottle 
 had been opened for the Squire four days before. His 
 hat was brushed, and laid on the hall table: his news- 
 papers, and his letter bag, with John Pendennis, Es- 
 quire, Fairoaks, engraved upon the brass plate, were 
 there in waiting. The doctor and the lawyer from 
 Clavering, who had seen the chaise pass through, came 
 up in a gig half an hour after the Major's arrival, and 
 entered by the back door. The former gave a detailed 
 account of the seizure and demise of Mr. Pendennis, en- 
 larged on his virtues and the estimation in which the 
 neighbourhood held him; on what a loss he would be to 
 the magistrates' bench, the County Hospital, &c. Mrs. 
 Pendennis bore up wonderfully, he said, especially since 
 Master Arthur's arrival. The lawyer stayed and dined 
 with Major Pendennis, and they talked business all the 
 evening. The Major was his brother's executor, and 
 joint guardian to the boy with Mrs. Pendennis. Every- 
 thing was left unreservedly to her, except in case of a 
 second marriage, an occasion which might offer itself 
 in the case of so young and handsome a woman, Mr. 
 Tatham gallantly said, when different provisions were 
 enacted by the deceased. The Major would of course 
 take entire superintendence of everything upon this 
 most impressive and melancholy occasion. Aware of 
 this authority, old John the footman, when he brought 
 Major Pendennis the candle to go to bed, followed af- 
 terwards with the plate-basket; and the next morning 
 brought him the key of the hall clock the Squire always 
 used to wind it up of a Thursday, John said. Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis's maid brought him messages from her mistress.
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 31 
 
 She confirmed the doctor's report, of the comfort which 
 Master Arthur's arrival had caused to his mother. 
 
 What passed between that lady and the boy is not of 
 import. A veil should be thrown over those sacred emo- 
 tions of love and grief. The maternal passion is a 
 sacred mystery to me. What one sees symbolized in the 
 Roman churches in the image of the Virgin Mother with 
 
 a bosom bleeding with love, I think one may witness 
 (and admire the Almighty bounty for) every day. I 
 saw a Jewish lady, only yesterday, with a child at her 
 knee, and from whose face towards the child there shone 
 a sweetness so angelical, that it seemed to form a sort of 
 glory round both. I protest I could have knelt before 
 her too, and adored in her the Divine beneficence in en- 
 dowing us with the maternal storgb, which began with 
 our race and sanctifies the history of mankind.
 
 32 PENDENNIS 
 
 As for Arthur Pendennis, after that awful shock 
 which the sight of his dead father must have produced 
 on him, and the pity and feeling which such an event no 
 doubt occasioned, I am not sure that in the very moment 
 of the grief, and as he embraced his mother, and tenderly 
 consoled her, and promised to love her for ever, there 
 was not springing up in his breast a sort of secret tri- 
 umph and exultation. He was the chief now and lord. 
 He was Pendennis; and all round about him were his 
 servants and handmaids. " You'll never send me away," 
 little Laura said, tripping by him, and holding his hand. 
 ' You won't send me to school, will you, Arthur? " 
 
 Arthur kissed her and patted her head. No, she 
 shouldn't go to school. As for going himself, that was 
 quite out of the question. He had determined that that 
 part of his life should not be renewed. In the midst of 
 the general grief, and the corpse still lying above, he had 
 leisure to conclude that he would have it all holidays for 
 the future, that he wouldn't get up till he liked, or stand 
 the bullying of the Doctor any more, and had made a 
 hundred of such day dreams and resolves for the future. 
 How one's thoughts will travel! and how quickly our 
 wishes beget them! When he with Laura in his hand 
 went into the kitchen on his way to the dog-kennel, the 
 fowl-houses, and other his favourite haunts, all the ser- 
 vants there assembled in great silence with their friends, 
 and the labouring men and their wives, and Sally Potter 
 who went with the post-bag to Clavering, and the 
 baker's man from Clavering all there assembled and 
 drinking beer on the melancholy occasion rose up on 
 his entrance and bowed or curtseyed to him. They never 
 used to do so last holidays, he felt at once and with in- 
 describable pleasure. The cook cried out, " O Lord,"
 
 PENDENNIS 33 
 
 and whispered, "How Master Arthur do grow!" 
 Thomas, the groom, in the act of drinking, put down the 
 jug alarmed before his master. Thomas's master felt 
 the honour keenly. He went through and looked at the 
 pointers. As Flora put her nose up to his waistcoat, 
 and Ponto, yelling with pleasure, hurtled at his chain, 
 Pen patronised the dogs, and said, " Poo Ponto, poo 
 Flora," in his most condescending manner. And then 
 he went and looked at Laura's hens, and at the pigs, and 
 at the orchard, and at the dairy; perhaps he blushed to 
 think that it was only last holidays he had in a manner 
 robbed the great apple-tree, and been scolded by the 
 dairymaid for taking cream. 
 
 They buried John Pendennis, Esquire, " formerly an 
 eminent medical practitioner at Bath and subsequently 
 an able magistrate, a benevolent landlord, and a bene- 
 factor to many charities and public institutions in this 
 neighbourhood and country," with one of the most hand- 
 some funerals that had been seen since Sir Roger Clav- 
 ering was buried here, the clerk said, in the abbey 
 church of Clavering St. Mary's. A fair marble slab, 
 from which the above inscription is copied, was erected 
 over the Fairoaks' pew in the church. On it you may 
 see the Pendennis coat of arms and crest, an eagle look- 
 ing towards the sun, with the motto " nee tenui pennd," 
 to the present day. Doctor Portman alluded to the de- 
 ceased most handsomely and affectingly, as " our dear 
 departed friend," in his sermon next Sunday; and Ar- 
 thur Pendennis reigned in his stead.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 IN WHICH PENDENNIS APPEARS AS A VERY YOUNG 
 MAN INDEED 
 
 RTHUR was about sixteen 
 years old, we have said, 
 when he began to reign; 
 in person, he had what 
 his friends would call a 
 dumpy, but his mamma 
 styled a neat little figure. 
 His hair was of a healthy 
 brown colour, which looks 
 like gold in the sunshine, 
 his face was round, rosy, 
 freckled, and good-hu- 
 moured, his whiskers were 
 decidedly of a reddish hue; 
 in fact, without being a 
 beauty, he had such a frank, 
 good-natured kind face, and 
 laughed so merrily at you 
 out of his honest blue eyes, that no wonder Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis thought him the pride of the whole country. Be- 
 tween the ages of sixteen and eighteen he rose from five 
 feet six to five feet eight inches in height, at which alti- 
 tude he paused. But his mother wondered at it. He 
 was three inches taller than his father. Was it possible 
 that any man could grow to be three inches taller than 
 Mr. Pendennis? 
 
 34
 
 PENDENNIS 35 
 
 You may be certain he never went back to school ; the 
 discipline of the establishment did not suit him, and he 
 liked being at home much better. The question of his 
 return was debated, and his uncle was for his going 
 back. The Doctor wrote his opinion that it was most 
 important for Arthur's success in after-life that he 
 should know a Greek play thoroughly, but Pen adroitly 
 managed to hint to his mother what a dangerous place 
 Grey Friars was, and what sad wild fellows some of the 
 chaps there were, and the timid soul, taking alarm at 
 once, acceded to his desire to stay at home. 
 
 Then Pen's uncle offered to use his influence with His 
 Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief, who was 
 pleased to be very kind to him, and proposed to get Pen 
 a commission in the Foot Guards. Pen's heart leaped 
 at this : he had been to hear the band at St. James's play 
 on a Sunday, when he went out to his uncle. He had 
 seen Tom Ricketts, of the fourth form, who used to 
 wear a jacket and trowsers so ludicrously tight, that the 
 elder boys could not forbear using him in the quality of 
 a butt or " cockshy " he had seen this very Ricketts 
 arrayed in crimson and gold, with an immense bearskin 
 cap on his head, staggering under the colours of the 
 regiment. Tom had recognised him and gave him a 
 patronising nod. Tom, a little wretch whom he had 
 cut over the back with a hockey-stick last quarter and 
 there he was in the centre of the square, rallying round 
 the flag of his country, surrounded by bayonets, cross- 
 belts, and scarlet, the band blowing trumpets and bang- 
 ing cymbals talking familiarly to immense warriors 
 with tufts to their chins and Waterloo medals. What 
 would not Pen have given to enter such a service? 
 
 But Helen Pendennis, when this point was proposed
 
 36 PENDENNIS 
 
 to her by her son, put on a face full of terror and alarm. 
 She said " she did not quarrel with others who thought 
 differently, but that in her opinion a Christian had no 
 right to make the army a profession. Mr. Pendennis 
 never, never would have permitted his son to be a sol- 
 dier. Finally, she should be very unhappy if he thought 
 of it." Now Pen would have as soon cut off his nose 
 and ears as deliberately, and of aforethought malice, 
 made his mother unhappy; and, as he was of such a 
 generous disposition that he would give away anything 
 to any one, he instantly made a present of his visionary 
 red coat and epaulettes to his mother. 
 
 She thought him the noblest creature in the world. 
 But Major Pendennis, when the offer of the commis- 
 sion was acknowledged and refused, wrote back a curt 
 and somewhat angry letter to the widow, and thought 
 his nephew was rather a spooney. 
 
 He was contented, however, when he saw the boy's 
 performances out hunting at Christmas, when the Ma- 
 jor came down as usual to Fairoaks. Pen had a very 
 good mare, and rode her with uncommon pluck and 
 grace. He took his fences with great coolness and 
 judgment. He wrote to the chaps at school about his 
 top-boots, and his feats across country. He began to 
 think seriously of a scarlet coat: and his mother must 
 own that she thought it would become him remarkably 
 well ; though, of course, she passed hours of anguish dur- 
 ing his absence, and daily expected to see him brought 
 home on a shutter. 
 
 With these amusements, in rather too great plenty, 
 it must not be assumed that Pen neglected his studies 
 altogether. He had a natural taste for reading every 
 possible kind of book which did not fall into his school-
 
 PENDENNIS 37 
 
 course. It was only when they forced his head into the 
 waters of knowledge that he refused to drink. He de- 
 voured all the books at home, from Inchbald's Theatre 
 to White's Farriery; he ransacked the neighbouring 
 book-cases. He found at Clavering an old cargo of 
 French novels, which he read with all his might; and 
 he would sit for hours perched up on the topmost bar 
 of Doctor Portman's library steps with a folio on his 
 knees, whether it were Hakluyt's Travels, Hobbes's Le- 
 viathan, Augustini Opera, or Chaucer's Poems. He 
 and the vicar were very good friends, and from his Rev- 
 erence, Pen learned that honest taste for port wine 
 which distinguished him through life. And as for Mrs. 
 Portman, who was not in the least jealous, though her 
 Doctor avowed himself in love with Mrs. Pendennis, 
 whom he pronounced to be by far the finest lady in the 
 country all her grief was, as she looked up fondly at 
 Pen perched on the book-ladder, that her daughter, 
 Minny, was too old for him as indeed she was Miss 
 Mira Portman being at that period only two years 
 younger than Pen's mother, and weighing as much as 
 Pen and Mrs. Pendennis together. 
 
 Are these details insipid? Look back, good friend, 
 at your own youth, and ask how was that? I like to 
 think of a well-nurtured boy, brave and gentle, warm- 
 hearted and loving, and looking the world in the face 
 with kind honest eyes. What bright colours it wore 
 then, and how you enjoyed it! A man has not many 
 years of such time. He does not know them whilst they 
 are with him. It is only when they are passed long away 
 that he remembers how dear and happy they were. 
 
 Mr. Smirke, Dr. Portman's curate, was engaged, at 
 a liberal salary, to walk or ride over from Clavering and
 
 38 PENDENNIS 
 
 pass several hours daily with the young gentleman. 
 Smirke was a man perfectly faultless at a tea-table, 
 wore a curl on his fair forehead, and tied his neck-cloth 
 with a melancholy grace. He was a decent scholar and 
 mathematician, and taught Pen as much as the lad was 
 ever disposed to learn, which was not much. For Pen 
 had soon taken the measure of his tutor, who, when he 
 came riding into the court-yard at Fairoaks on his pony, 
 turned out his toes so absurdly, and left such a gap be- 
 tween his knees and the saddle, that it was impossible for 
 any lad endowed with a sense of humour to respect such 
 an equestrian. He nearly killed Smirke with terror 
 by putting him on his mare, and taking him a ride over 
 a common, where the county fox-hounds (then hunted by 
 that staunch old sportsman, Mr. Hardhead, of Dump- 
 lingbeare) happened to meet. Mr. Smirke, on Pen's 
 mare, Rebecca (she was named after Pen's favourite 
 heroine, the daughter of Isaac of York), astounded the 
 hounds as much as he disgusted the huntsman, laming 
 one of the former by persisting in riding amongst the 
 pack, and receiving a speech from the latter, more re- 
 markable for energy of language, than any oration he 
 had ever heard since he left the bargemen on the banks 
 of the Isis. 
 
 Smirke and his pupil read the ancient poets together, 
 and rattled through them at a pleasant rate, very dif- 
 ferent from that steady grubbing pace with which the 
 Cistercians used to go over the classic ground, scenting 
 out each word as they went, and digging up every root 
 in the way. Pen never liked to halt, but made his tutor 
 construe when he was at fault, and thus galloped 
 through the Iliad and the Odyssey, the tragic play- 
 writers, and the charming wicked Aristophanes (whom
 
 PENDENNIS 39 
 
 he vowed to be the greatest poet of all ) . But he went 
 so fast that, though he certainly galloped through a con- 
 siderable extent of the ancient country, he clean forgot 
 it in after-life, and had only such a vague remembrance 
 of his early classic course as a man has in the House of 
 Commons, let us say, who still keeps up two or three 
 quotations; or a reviewer who, just for decency's sake, 
 hints at a little Greek. 
 
 Besides the ancient poets, you may be sure Pen read 
 the English with great gusto. Smirke sighed and shook 
 his head sadly both about Byron and Moore. But Pen 
 was a sworn fire-worshipper and a Corsair ; he had them 
 by heart, and used to take little Laura into the window 
 and say, " Zuleika, I am not thy brother," in tones 
 so tragic, that they caused the solemn little maid to 
 open her great eyes still wider. She sat, until the 
 proper hour for retirement, sewing at Mrs. Penden- 
 nis's' knee, and listening to Pen reading out to her of 
 nights without comprehending one word of what he 
 read. 
 
 He read Shakspeare to his mother (which she said 
 she liked, but didn't), and Byron, and Pope, and his fa- 
 vourite Lalla Rookh, which pleased her indifferently. 
 But as for Bishop Heber, and Mrs. Hemans above all, 
 this lady used to melt right away, and be absorbed into 
 her pocket-handkerchief, when Pen read those authors 
 to her in his kind boyish voice. The " Christian Year " 
 was a book which appeared about that time. The son 
 and the mother whispered it to each other with awe 
 Faint, very faint, and seldom in after-life Pendennis 
 heard that solemn church-music: but he always loved 
 the remembrance of it, and of the times when it struck 
 on his heart, and he walked over the fields full of hope
 
 40 PENDENNIS 
 
 and void of doubt, as the church-bells rang out on Sun- 
 day morning. 
 
 It was at this period of his existence, that Pen broke 
 out in the Poets' Corner of the County Chronicle, with 
 some verses with which he was perfectly well satisfied. 
 His are the verses signed " NEP.," addressed " To a 
 Tear; " " On the Anniversary of the Battle of Water- 
 loo ; " ' To Madame Caradori singing at the Assize 
 Meetings;" "On Saint Bartholomew's Day" (a tre- 
 mendous denunciation of Popery and a solemn warning 
 to the people of England to rally against emancipating 
 the Roman Catholics), &c., &c. all which masterpieces, 
 poor Mrs. Pendennis kept along with his first socks, the 
 first cutting of his hair, his bottle, and other interest- 
 ing relics of his infancy. He used to gallop Rebecca 
 over the neighbouring Dumpling Downs, or into the 
 county town, which, if you please, we shall call Chat- 
 teris, spouting his own poems, and filled with quite a 
 Byronic afflatus as he thought. 
 
 His genius at this time was of a decidedly gloomy 
 cast. He brought his mother a tragedy, at which, though 
 he killed sixteen people before the second act, Helen 
 laughed so, that he thrust the master-piece into the fire 
 in a pet. He projected an epic poem in blank verse, 
 " Cortez, or the Conqueror of Mexico, and the Inca's 
 daughter." He wrote part of " Seneca, or the Fatal 
 Bath," and " Ariadne in Naxos; " classical pieces, with 
 choruses and strophes and antistrophes, which sadly puz- 
 zled Mrs. Pendennis; and began a " History of the 
 Jesuits," in which he lashed that Order with tremendous 
 severity. His loyalty did his mother's heart good to 
 witness. He was a staunch, unflinching Church-and- 
 King man in those days; and at the election, when Sir
 
 PENDENNIS 41 
 
 Giles Beanfield stood on the Blue interest, against Lord 
 Trehawk, Lord Eyrie's son, a Whig and a friend of 
 Popery, Arthur Pendennis, with an immense bow for 
 himself, which his mother made, and with a blue ribbon 
 for Rebecca, rode alongside of the Reverend Doctor 
 Portman, on his grey mare Dowdy, and at the head of 
 the Clavering voters, whom the Doctor brought up to 
 plump for the Protestant Champion. 
 
 On that day Pen made his first speech at the Blue 
 Hotel: and also, it appears, for the first time in his life 
 took a little more wine than was good for him. 
 Mercy! what a scene it was at Fairoaks, when he rode 
 back at ever so much o'clock at night. What moving 
 about of lanterns in the court-yards and stables, though 
 the moon was shining out ; what a gathering of servants, 
 as Pen came home, clattering over the bridge and up 
 the stable-yard, with half -a-score of the Clavering voters 
 yelling after him the Blue song of the election. 
 
 He wanted them all to come in and have some wine 
 some very good Madeira some capital Madeira John 
 go and get some Madeira, and there is no knowing 
 what the farmers would have done, had not Madam 
 Pendennis made her appearance in a white wrapper 
 with a candle and scared those zealous Blues so by the 
 sight of her pale handsome face, that they touched their 
 hats and rode off. 
 
 Besides these amusements and occupations in which 
 Mr. Pen indulged, there was one which forms the main 
 business and pleasure of youth, if the poets tell us aright, 
 whom Pen was always studying; and which, ladies, you 
 have rightly guessed to be that of Love. Pen sighed 
 for it first in secret, and, like the love-sick swain in Ovid, 
 opened his breast and said, " Aura,-veni." What gener-
 
 42 PENDENNIS 
 
 ous youth is there that has not courted some such windy 
 mistress in his time? 
 
 Yes, Pen began to feel the necessity of a first love 
 of a consuming passion of an object on which he could 
 concentrate all those vague floating fancies under which 
 he sweetly suffered of a young lady to whom he could 
 really make verses, and whom he could set up and adore, 
 in place of those unsubstantial lanthes and Zuleikas to 
 whom he addressed the outpourings of his gushing muse. 
 He read his favourite poems over and over again, he 
 called upon Alma Venus the delight of gods and men, 
 he translated Anacreon's odes, and picked out passages 
 suitable to his complaint from Waller, Dryden, Prior, 
 and the like. Smirke and he were never weary, in their 
 interviews, of discoursing about love. The faithless 
 tutor entertained him with sentimental conversations 
 in place of lectures on algebra and Greek; for Smirke 
 was in love too. Who could help it, being in daily inter- 
 course with such a woman? Smirke was madly in love 
 (as far as such a mild flame as Mr. Smirke's may be 
 called madness) with Mrs. Pendennis. That honest lady, 
 sitting down below stairs teaching little Laura to play 
 the piano, or devising flannel petticoats for the poor 
 round about her, or otherwise busied with the calm rou- 
 tine of her modest and spotless Christian life, was little 
 aware what storms were brewing in two bosoms up stairs 
 in the study in Pen's as he sate in his shooting- jacket, 
 with his elbows on the green study-table, and his hands 
 clutching his curly brown hair, Homer under his nose, 
 and in worthy Mr. Smirke's, with whom he was reading. 
 Here they would talk about Helen and Andromache. 
 " Andromache's like my mother," Pen used to avouch ; 
 " but I say, Smirke, by Jove I'd cut off my nose to see
 
 PENDENNIS 43 
 
 Helen;" and he would spout certain favourite lines 
 which the reader will find in their proper place in the 
 third book. He drew portraits of her they are extant 
 still with straight noses and enormous eyes, and " Ar- 
 thur Pendennis delineavit et pinxit " gallantly written 
 underneath. 
 
 As for Mr. Smirke he naturally preferred Androm- 
 ache. And in consequence he was uncommonly kind 
 to Pen. He gave him his Elzevir Horace, of which the 
 boy was fond, and his little Greek Testament which his 
 own mamma at Clapham had purchased and presented 
 to him. He bought him a silver pencil case ; and in the 
 matter of learning let him do just as much or as little 
 as ever he pleased. He always seemed to be on the point 
 of unbosoming himself to Pen: nay, he confessed to 
 the latter that he had a an attachment, an ardently 
 cherished attachment, about which Pendennis longed to 
 hear, and said, " Tell us, old chap, is she handsome? has 
 she got blue eyes or black?" But Doctor Portman's 
 curate, heaving a gentle sigh, cast up his eyes to the ceil- 
 ing, and begged Pen faintly to change the conversation. 
 Poor Smirke! He invited Pen to dine at his lodgings 
 over Madame Fribsby's, the milliner's in Clavering, and 
 once when it was raining, and Mrs. Pendennis, who had 
 driven in her pony-chaise into Clavering with respect to 
 some arrangements, about leaving off mourning proba- 
 bly, was prevailed upon to enter the curate's apartments, 
 he sent for pound-cakes instantly. The sofa on which 
 she sate became sacred to him from that day: and he 
 kept flowers in the glass which she drank from ever 
 after. 
 
 As Mrs. Pendennis was never tired of hearing the 
 praises of her son, we may be certain that this rogue
 
 44, PENDENNIS 
 
 of a tutor neglected no opportunity of conversing with 
 her upon the subject. It might be a little tedious to 
 him to hear the stories about Pen's generosity, about his 
 bravery in fighting the big naughty boy, about his fun 
 and jokes, about his prodigious skill in Latin, music, 
 riding, &c. but what price would he not pay to be in 
 her company? and the widow, after these conversations, 
 thought Mr. Smirke a very pleasing and well-informed 
 man. As for her son, she had not settled in her mind, 
 whether he was to be Senior Wrangler and Archbishop 
 of Canterbury, or Double First Class at Oxford, and 
 Lord Chancellor. That all England did not possess 
 his peer, was a fact about which there was, in her mind, 
 no manner of question. 
 
 A simple person, of inexpensive habits, she began 
 forthwith to save, and, perhaps, to be a little parsimoni- 
 ous, in favour of her boy. There were no entertain- 
 ments, of course, at Fairoaks, during the year of her 
 weeds. Nor, indeed, did the Doctor's silver dish-covers, 
 of which he was so proud, and which were flourished all 
 over with the arms of the Pendennises, and surmounted 
 with their crest, come out of the plate-chest again for 
 long, long years. The household was diminished, and its 
 expenses curtailed. There was a very blank anchorite 
 repast when Pen dined from home: and he himself 
 headed the remonstrance from the kitchen regarding 
 the deteriorated quality of the Fairoaks beer. She 
 was becoming miserly for Pen. Indeed, who ever ac- 
 cused women of being just? They are always sacrific- 
 ing themselves or somebody for somebody else's sake. 
 
 There happened to be no young woman in the small 
 circle of friends who were in the widow's intimacy whom 
 Pendennis could by any possibility grajtify by endowing
 
 PENDENNIS 45 
 
 her with the inestimable treasure of a heart which he 
 was longing to give away. Some young fellows in this 
 predicament bestow their young affections upon Dolly, 
 the dairymaid, or cast the eyes of tenderness upon 
 Molly, the blacksmith's daughter. Pen thought a Pen- 
 dennis much too grand a personage to stoop so low. 
 He was too high-minded for a vulgar intrigue, and at 
 the idea of a seduction, had he ever entertained it, his 
 heart would have revolted as from the notion of any act 
 of baseness or dishonour. Miss Mira Portman was too 
 old, too large, and too fond of reading " Rollin's An- 
 cient History." The Miss Boardbacks, Admiral Board- 
 back's daughters (of St. Vincent's, or Fourth of June 
 House, as it was called), disgusted Pen with the Lon- 
 don airs which they brought into the country. Captain 
 Glanders's (H. P., 50th Dragoon Guards) three girls 
 were in brown-holland pinafores as yet, with the ends 
 of their hair-plaits tied up in dirty pink ribbon. Not 
 having acquired the art of dancing, the youth avoided 
 such chances as he might have had of meeting with the 
 fair sex at the Chatteris Assemblies ; in fine, he was not 
 in love, because there was nobody at hand to fall in love 
 with. And the young monkey used to ride out, day 
 after day, in quest of Dulcinea ; and peep into the pony- 
 chaises and gentlefolks' carriages, as they drove along 
 the broad turnpike roads, with a heart beating within 
 him, and a secret tremor and hope that she might be in 
 that yellow post-chaise coming swinging up the hill, or 
 one of those three girls in beaver bonnets in the back seat 
 of the double gig, which the fat old gentleman in black 
 was driving, at four miles an hour. The post-chaise 
 contained a snuffy old dowager of seventy, with a maid, 
 her contemporary. The three girls in the beaver bonnets
 
 46 PENDENNIS 
 
 were no handsomer than the turnips that skirted the 
 roadside. Do as he might, and ride where he would, 
 the fairy princess whom he was to rescue and win, had 
 not yet appeared to honest Pen. 
 
 Upon these points he did not discourse to his mother. 
 He had a world of his own. What ardent, imaginative 
 soul has not a secret pleasure-place in which it disports ? 
 Let no clumsy prying or dull meddling of ours try to 
 disturb it in our children. Actaeon was a brute for want- 
 ing to push in where Diana was bathing. Leave him 
 occasionally alone, my good madam, if you have a poet 
 for a child. Even your admirable advice may be a bore 
 sometimes. Yonder little child may have thoughts too 
 deep even for your great mind, and fancies so coy and 
 timid that they will not bare themselves when your lady- 
 ship sits by. 
 
 Helen Pendennis by the force of sheer love divined 
 a great number of her son's secrets. But she kept these 
 things in her heart (if we may so speak), and did not 
 speak of them. Besides, she had made up her mind that 
 he was to marry little Laura: she would be eighteen 
 when Pen was six-and-twenty ; and had finished his 
 college career; and had made his grand tour; and was 
 settled either in London, astonishing all the metropolis 
 by his learning and eloquence at the bar, or better still 
 in a sweet country parsonage surrounded with holly- 
 hocks and roses, close to a delightful romantic ivy-cov- 
 ered church, from the pulpit of which Pen would utter 
 the most beautiful sermons ever preached. 
 
 While these natural sentiments were waging war and 
 trouble in honest Pen's bosom, it chanced one day that
 
 PENDENNIS 47 
 
 he rode into Chatteris for the purpose of carrying to 
 the County Chronicle a tremendous and thrilling poem 
 for the next week's paper ; and putting up his horse ac- 
 cording to custom, at the stables of the George Hotel 
 there, he fell in with an old acquaintance. A grand 
 black tandem, with scarlet wheels, came rattling into 
 the inn yard, as Pen stood there in converse with the 
 ostler about Rebecca ; and the voice of the driver called 
 out, " Hallo, Pendennis, is that you? " in a loud patro- 
 nising manner. Pen had some difficulty in recognising, 
 under the broad-brimmed hat and the vast greatcoats and 
 neck-cloths, with which the new comer was habited, the 
 person and figure of his quondam schoolfellow, Mr. 
 Foker. 
 
 A year's absence had made no small difference in that 
 gentleman. A youth who had been deservedly whipped 
 a few months previously, and who spent his pocket- 
 money on tarts and hardbake, now appeared before Pen 
 in one of those costumes to which the public consent, 
 which I take to be quite as influential in this respect as 
 " Johnson's Dictionary," has awarded the title of 
 " Swell." He had a bull-dog between his legs, and in 
 his scarlet shawl neck -cloth was a pin representing an- 
 other bull-dog in gold: he wore a fur waistcoat laced 
 over with gold chains ; a green cut-away coat with bas- 
 ket buttons, and a white upper-coat ornamented with 
 cheese-plate buttons, on each of which was engraved 
 some stirring incident of the road or the chase; all of 
 which ornaments set off this young fellow's figure to 
 such advantage, that you would hesitate to say which 
 character in life he most resembled, and whether he was 
 a boxer en goguette, or a coachman in his gala suit.
 
 48 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Left that place for good, Pendennis?" Mr. Foker 
 said, descending from his landau and giving Pendennis 
 a finger. 
 
 * Yes, this year or more," Pen said. 
 
 " Beastly old hole," Mr. Foker remarked. " Hate 
 it. Hate the Doctor: hate Towzer, the second master; 
 hate everybody there. Not a fit place for a gentleman." 
 
 " Not at all," said Pen, with an air of the utmost con- 
 sequence. 
 
 " By gad, sir, I sometimes dream, now, that the Doc- 
 tor's walking into me," Foker continued (and Pen 
 smiled as he thought that he himself had likewise fear 
 ful dreams of this nature) . ' When I think of the diet 
 there, by gad, sir, I wonder how I stood it. Mangy 
 mutton, brutal beef, pudding on Thursdays and Sun- 
 days, and that fit to poison you. Just look at my leader 
 did you ever see a prettier animal? Drove over from 
 Baymouth. Came the nine mile in two-and-forty min- 
 utes. Not bad going, sir." 
 
 "Are you stopping at Baymouth, Foker?" Penden- 
 nis asked. 
 
 " I'm coaching there," said the other with a nod. 
 
 " What? " asked Pen, and in a tone of such wonder, 
 that Foker burst out laughing, and said, " He was 
 blowed if he didn't think Pen was such a flat as not to 
 know what coaching meant." 
 
 " I'm come down with a coach from Oxbridge. A 
 tutor, don't you see, old boy? He's coaching me, and 
 some other men, for the little go. Me and Spavin have 
 the drag between us. And I thought I'd just tool over 
 and go to the play. Did you ever see Rowkins do the 
 hornpipe? " and Mr. Foker began to perform some 
 steps of that popular dance in the inn yard, looking
 
 PENDENNIS 49 
 
 round for the sympathy of his groom, and the stable 
 men. 
 
 Pen thought he would like to go to the play too : and 
 could ride home afterwards, as there was a moonlight. 
 So he accepted Foker's invitation to dinner, and the 
 young men entered the inn together, where Mr. Foker 
 stopped at the bar, and called upon Miss Rummer, the 
 landlady's fair daughter, who presided there, to give 
 him a glass of " his mixture." 
 
 Pen and his family had been known at the George 
 ever since they came into the county; and Mr. Pen- 
 dennis's carriage and horses always put up there when 
 he paid a visit to the county town. The landlady 
 dropped the heir of Fairoaks a very respectful curtsey, 
 and complimented him upon his growth and manly ap- 
 pearance, and asked news of the family at Fairoaks, 
 and of Dr. Portman and the Clavering people, to all 
 of which questions the young gentleman answered with 
 much affability. But he spoke to Mr. and Mrs. Rum- 
 mer with that sort of good nature with which a young 
 Prince addresses his father's subjects; never dreaming 
 that those " bonnes gens " were his equals in life. 
 
 Mr. Foker's behaviour was quite different. He in- 
 quired for Rummer and the cold in his nose, told Mrs. 
 Rummer a riddle, asked Miss Rummer when she would 
 be ready to marry him, and paid his compliments to Miss 
 Brett, the other young lady in the bar, all in a minute of 
 time, and with a liveliness and facetiousness which set 
 all these ladies in a giggle ; and he gave a cluck, expres- 
 sive of great satisfaction, as he tossed off his mixture 
 which Miss Rummer prepared and handed to him. 
 
 " Have a drop," said he to Pen. " Give the young 
 one a glass, R., and score it up to yours truly."
 
 50 PENDENNIS 
 
 Poor Pen took a glass, and everybody laughed at the 
 face which he made as he put it down Gin, bitters, and 
 some other cordial, was the compound with which Mr. 
 Foker was so delighted as to call it by the name of 
 Foker's own. As Pen choked, sputtered, and made 
 faces, the other took occasion to remark to Mr. Rummer 
 that the young fellow was green, very green, but that he 
 would soon form him ; and then they proceeded to order 
 dinner which Mr. Foker determined should consist of 
 turtle and venison; cautioning the landlady to be very 
 particular about icing the wine. 
 
 Then Messrs. Foker and Pen strolled down the High 
 Street together the former having a cigar in his mouth, 
 which he had drawn out of a case almost as big as a 
 portmanteau. He went in to replenish it at Mr. Lewis's, 
 and talked to that gentleman for a while, sitting down 
 on the counter: he then looked in at the fruiterer's, to 
 see the pretty girl there: then they passed the County 
 Chronicle office, for which Pen had his packet ready, 
 in the shape of " Lines to Thyrza," but poor Pen did 
 not like to put the letter into the editor's box while walk- 
 ing in company with such a fine gentleman as Mr. 
 Foker. They met heavy dragoons of the regiment al- 
 ways quartered at Chatteris; and stopped and talked 
 about the Baymouth balls, and what a pretty girl was 
 Miss Brown, and what a dem fine woman Mrs. Jones 
 was. It was in vain that Pen recalled to his own mind 
 how stupid Foker used to be at school how he could 
 scarcely read, how he was not cleanly in his person, and 
 notorious for his blunders and dullness. Mr. Foker was 
 not much more refined now than in his school days : and 
 yet Pen felt a secret pride in strutting down High Street 
 with a young fellow who owned tandems, talked to of-
 
 Youth between Pleasure 
 and Duty
 
 PENDENNIS 51 
 
 ficers, and ordered turtle and champagne for dinner. 
 He listened, and with respect too, to Mr. Foker's ac- 
 counts of what the men did at the University of which 
 Mr. F. was an ornament, and encountered a long series 
 of stories about boat-racing, bumping, College grass- 
 plats, and milk-punch and began to wish to go up him- 
 self to College to a place where there were such manly 
 pleasures and enjoyments. Farmer Gurnett, who lives 
 close by Fairoaks, riding by at this minute and touching 
 his hat to Pen, the latter stopped him, and sent a message 
 to his mother to say that he had met with an old school- 
 fellow, and should dine in Chatteris. 
 
 The two young gentlemen continued their walk, and 
 were passing round the Cathedral Yard, where they 
 could hear the music of the afternoon service (a music 
 which always exceedingly affected Pen), but whither 
 Mr. Foker came for the purpose of inspecting the nur- 
 sery maids who frequent the Elms Walk there, and 
 here they strolled until with a final burst of music the 
 small congregation was played out. 
 
 Old Doctor Portman was one of the few who came 
 from the venerable gate. Spying Pen, he came and 
 shook him by the hand, and eyed with wonder Pen's 
 friend, from whose mouth and cigar clouds of fragrance 
 issued, which curled round the Doctor's honest face and 
 shovel hat. 
 
 " An old schoolfellow of mine, Mr. Foker," said Pen. 
 The Doctor said "H'm": and scowled at the cigar. 
 He did not mind a pipe in his study, but the cigar was 
 an abomination to the worthy gentleman. 
 
 " I came up on Bishop's business," the Doctor said. 
 ' We'll ride home, Arthur, if you like? " 
 
 " I I'm engaged to my friend here," Pen answered.
 
 52 PENDENNIS 
 
 ' You had better come home with me," said the 
 Doctor. 
 
 " His mother knows he's out, sir," Mr. Foker re- 
 marked: " don't she, Pendennis? " 
 
 " But that does not prove that he had not better come 
 home with me," the Doctor growled, and he walked off 
 with great dignity. 
 
 " Old boy don't like the weed, I suppose," Foker said. 
 " Hal who's here? here's the General, and Bingley, the 
 manager. How do, Cos? How do, Bingley? " 
 
 " How does my worthy and gallant young Foker? " 
 said the gentleman addressed as the General; and who 
 wore a shabby military cape with a mangy collar, and 
 a hat cocked very much over one eye. 
 
 " Trust you are very well, my very dear sir," said the 
 other gentleman, " and that the Theatre Royal will have 
 the honour of your patronage to-night. We perform 
 * The Stranger,' in which your humble servant will 
 
 " Can't stand you in tights and Hessians, Bingley," 
 young Mr. Foker said. On which the General, with the 
 Irish accent, said, " But I think ye'll like Miss Fother- 
 ingay, in Mrs. Haller, or me name's not Jack Costigan." 
 
 Pen looked at these individuals with the greatest in- 
 terest. He had never seen an actor before ; and he saw 
 Dr. Portman's red face looking over the Doctor's 
 shoulder, as he retreated from the Cathedral Yard, evi- 
 dently quite dissatisfied with the acquaintances into 
 whose hands Pen had fallen. 
 
 Perhaps it would have been much better for him had 
 he taken the parson's advice and company home. But 
 which of us knows his fate?
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 MRS. HALLER 
 
 AVING returned to the 
 George, Mr. Foker 
 and his guest sate 
 down to a handsome 
 repast in the coffee- 
 room ; where Mr. 
 Rummer brought in 
 the first dish, and 
 bowed asf gravely as 
 if he was waiting up- 
 on the Lord-Lieu- 
 tenant of the county. 
 Pen could not but 
 respect Foker's con- 
 noisseurship as he pronounced the champagne to be con- 
 demned gooseberry, and winked at the port with one eye. 
 The latter he declared to be of the right sort ; and told the 
 waiters, there was no way of humbugging him. All 
 these attendants he knew by their Christian names, and 
 showed a great interest in their families; and as the 
 London coaches drove up, which in those early days 
 used to set off from the George, Mr. Foker flung the 
 coffee-room window open, and called the guards and 
 coachmen by their Christian names, too, asking about 
 their respective families, and imitating with great live- 
 liness and accuracy the tooting of the horns as Jem the 
 
 53
 
 54 PENDENNIS 
 
 ostler whipped the horses' cloths off, and the carriages 
 drove gaily away. 
 
 " A bottle of sherry, a bottle of sham, a bottle of port 
 and a shass caffy, it ain't so bad, hay, Pen? " Foker said, 
 and pronounced, after all these delicacies and a quantity 
 of nuts and fruit had been dispatched, that it was time 
 to " toddle." Pen sprang up with very bright eyes, and 
 a flushed face ; and they moved off towards the theatre, 
 where they paid their money to the wheezy old lady slum- 
 bering in the money-taker's box. " Mrs. Dropsicum, 
 Bingley's mother-in-law, great in Lady Macbeth," Fo- 
 ker said to his companion. Foker knew her, too. 
 
 They had almost their choice of places in the boxes 
 of the theatre, which was no better filled than country 
 theatres usually are in spite of the " universal burst of 
 attraction and galvanic thrills of delight " advertised 
 by Bingley in the play-bills. A score or so of people 
 dotted the pit-benches, a few more kept a kicking and 
 whistling in the galleries, and a dozen others, who came 
 in with free admissions, were in the boxes where our 
 young gentlemen sate. Lieutenant Rodgers and Pod- 
 gers, and young Cornet Tidmus, of the Dragoons, oc- 
 cupied a private box. The performers acted to them, 
 and these gentlemen seemed to hold conversations with 
 the players when not engaged in the dialogue, and ap- 
 plauded them by name loudly. 
 
 Bingley the manager, who assumed all the chief tragic 
 and comic parts except when he modestly retreated to 
 make way for the London stars, who came down occa- 
 sionally to Chatteris, was great in the character of the 
 " Stranger." He was attired in the tight pantaloons 
 and Hessian boots which the stage legend has given to 
 that injured man, with a large cloak and beaver and a
 
 PENDENNIS 55 
 
 hearse-feather in it drooping over his raddled old face, 
 and only partially concealing his great buckled brown 
 wig. He had the stage- jewellery on too, of which he 
 selected the largest and most shiny rings for himself, 
 and allowed his little finger to quiver out of his cloak 
 with a sham diamond ring covering the first joint of the 
 finger and twiddling in the faces of the pit. Bingley 
 made it a favour to the young men of his company to 
 go on in light comedy parts with that ring. They flat- 
 tered him by asking its history. The stage has its tra- 
 ditional jewels, as the Crown and all great families have. 
 This had belonged to George Frederick Cooke, who had 
 had it from Mr. Quin, who may have bought it for a 
 shilling. Bingley fancied the world was fascinated with 
 its glitter. 
 
 He was reading out of the stage-book that wonder- 
 ful stage-book which is not bound like any other book 
 in the world, but is rouged and tawdry like the hero or 
 heroine who holds it; and who holds it as people never 
 do hold books : and points with his finger to a passage, 
 and wags his head ominously at the audience, and then 
 lifts up eyes and finger to the ceiling, professing to 
 derive some intense consolation from the work between 
 which and heaven there is a strong affinity. 
 
 As soon as the Stranger saw the young men, he acted 
 at them ; eyeing them solemnly over his gilt volume as 
 he lay on the stage-bank showing his hand, his ring, and 
 his Hessians. He calculated the effect that every one 
 of these ornaments would produce upon his victims: 
 he was determined to fascinate them, for he knew they 
 had paid their money; and he saw their families com- 
 ing in from the country and filling the cane chairs in his 
 boxes.
 
 56 PENDENNIS 
 
 As he lay on the bank reading, his servant, Francis, 
 made remarks upon his master. 
 
 " Again reading," said Francis, " thus it is, from 
 morn to night. To him nature has no beauty life no 
 charm. For three years I have never seen him smile " 
 (the gloom of Bingley's face was fearful to witness 
 during these comments of the faithful domestic). 
 " Nothing diverts him. O, if he would but attach him- 
 self to any living thing, were it an animal for some- 
 thing man must love." 
 
 [Enter Tobias (Goll) from the hut] He cries, " O, 
 how refreshing, after seven long weeks, to feel these 
 warm sunbeams once again. Thanks, bounteous heaven, 
 for the joy I taste!" He presses his cap between his 
 hands, looks up and prays. The Stranger eyes him 
 attentively. 
 
 Francis to the Stranger. ' This old man's share of 
 earthly happiness can be but little. Yet mark how 
 grateful he is for his portion of it." 
 
 Bingley. " Because, though old, he is but a child in 
 the leading-string of hope." (He looks steadily at 
 Foker, who, however, continues to suck the top of his 
 stick in an unconcerned manner.) 
 
 Francis. " Hope is the nurse of life." 
 
 Bingley. " And her cradle is the grave." 
 
 The Stranger uttered this with the moan of a bassoon 
 in agony, and fixed his glance on Pendennis so steadily, 
 that the poor lad was quite put out of countenance. He 
 thought the whole house must be looking at him; and 
 cast his eyes down. As soon as ever he raised them 
 Bingley's were at him again. All through the scene the 
 manager played at him. How relieved the lad was when 
 the scene ended, and Foker, tapping with his cane, cried 
 out "Bravo, Bingley!"
 
 PENDENNIS 57 
 
 " Give him a hand, Pendennis; you know every chap 
 likes a hand," Mr. Foker said; and the good-natured 
 young gentleman, and Pendennis laughing, and the 
 dragoons in the opposite box, began clapping hands to 
 the best of their power. 
 
 A chamber in Wintersen Castle closed over Tobias's 
 hut and the Stranger and his boots; and servants ap- 
 peared bustling about with chairs and tables" That's 
 Hicks and Miss Thackthwaite," whispered Foker. 
 " Pretty girl, ain't she, Pendennis? But stop hurray 
 bravo! here's the Fotheringay." 
 
 The pit thrilled and thumped its umbrellas; a volley 
 of applause was fired from the gallery: the Dragoon 
 officers and Foker clapped their hands furiously: you 
 would have thought the house was full, so loud were their 
 plaudits. The red face and ragged whiskers of Mr. 
 Costigan were seen peering from the side-scene. Pen's 
 eyes opened wide and bright, as Mrs. Haller entered 
 with a downcast look, then rallying at the sound of the 
 applause, swept the house with a grateful glance, and, 
 folding her hands across her breast, sank down in a 
 magnificent curtsey. More applause, more umbrellas; 
 Pen this time, flaming with wine and enthusiasm, 
 clapped hands and sang " Bravo " louder than all. Mrs. 
 Haller saw him, and everybody else, and old Mr. Bows, 
 the little first fiddler of the orchestra (which was this 
 night increased by a detachment of the band of the 
 Dragoons, by the kind permission of Colonel Swallow- 
 tail), looked up from the desk where he was perched, 
 with his crutch beside him, and smiled at the enthusiasm 
 of the lad. 
 
 Those who have only seen Miss Fotheringay in later 
 days, since her marriage and introduction into London 
 life, have little idea how beautiful a creature she was at
 
 58 PENDENNIS 
 
 the time when our friend Pen first set eyes on her. She 
 was of the tallest of women, and at her then age of six- 
 and-twenty for six-and-twenty she was, though she 
 vows she was only nineteen in the prime and fulness 
 of her beauty. Her forehead was vast, and her black 
 hair waved over it with a natural ripple, and was con- 
 fined in shining and voluminous braids at the back of 
 a neck such as you see on the shoulders of the Louvre 
 Venus that delight of gods and men. Her eyes, when 
 she lifted them up to gaze on you, and ere she dropped 
 their purple deep-fringed lids, shone with tenderness 
 and mystery unfathomable. Love and Genius seemed 
 to look out from them and then retire coyly, as if 
 ashamed to have been seen at the lattice. Who could 
 have had such a commanding brow but a woman of high 
 intellect? She never laughed ( indeed her teeth were not 
 good ) , but a smile of endless tenderness and sweetness 
 played round her beautiful lips, and in the dimples of 
 her cheeks and her lovely chin. Her nose defied de- 
 scription in those days. Her ears were like two little 
 pearl shells, which the earrings she wore (though the 
 handsomest properties in the theatre) only insulted. 
 She was dressed in long flowing robes of black, which 
 she managed and swept to and fro with wonderful grace, 
 and out of the folds of which you only saw her sandals 
 occasionally ; they were of rather a large size ; but Pen 
 thought them as ravishing as the slippers of Cinderella. 
 But it was her hand and arm that this magnificent crea- 
 ture most excelled in, and somehow you could never see 
 her but through them. They surrounded her. When 
 she folded them over her bosom in resignation; when 
 she dropped them in mute agony, or raised them in su- 
 perb command ; when in sportive gaiety her hands flut-
 
 PENDENNIS 59 
 
 tered and waved before her, like what shall we say? 
 like the snowy doves before the chariot of Venus it 
 was with these arms and hands that she beckoned, re- 
 pelled, entreated, embraced her admirers no single one, 
 for she was armed with her own virtue, and with her 
 father's valour, whose sword would have leapt from its 
 scabbard at any insult offered to his child but the whole 
 house ; which rose to her, as the phrase was, as she curt- 
 seyed and bowed, and charmed it. 
 
 Thus she stood for a minute complete and beautiful 
 as Pen stared at her. " I say, Pen, isn't she a stun- 
 ner? " asked Mr. Foker. 
 
 " Hush! " Pen said. " She's speaking." 
 
 She began her business in a deep sweet voice. Those 
 who know the play of the " Stranger," are aware that 
 the remarks made by the various characters are not val- 
 uable in themselves, either for their sound sense, their 
 novelty of observation, or their poetic fancy. 
 
 Nobody ever talked so. If we meet idiots in life, as 
 will happen, it is a great mercy that they do not use such 
 absurdly fine words. The Stranger's talk is sham, like 
 the book he reads, and the hair he wears, and the bank 
 he sits on, and the diamond ring he makes play with 
 but, in the midst of the balderdash, there runs that real- 
 ity of love, children, and forgiveness of wrong, which 
 will be listened to wherever it is preached, and sets all 
 the world sympathising. 
 
 With what smothered sorrow, with what gushing 
 pathos, Mrs. Haller delivered her part! At first, when 
 as Count Wintersen's housekeeper, and preparing for 
 his Excellency's arrival, she has to give orders about the 
 beds and furniture, and the dinner, &c., to be got ready, 
 she did so with the calm agony of despair. But when
 
 60 PENDENNIS 
 
 she could get rid of the stupid servants, and give vent 
 to her feelings to the pit and the house, she overflowed 
 to each individual as if he were her particular confidant, 
 and she was crying out her griefs on his shoulder: the 
 little fiddler in the orchestra (whom she did not seem to 
 watch, though he followed her ceaselessly) twitched, 
 . twisted, nodded, pointed about, and when she came to 
 the favourite passage " I have a William, too, if he be 
 still alive Ah, yes, if he be still alive. His little sisters, 
 too! Why, Fancy, dost thou rack me so? Why dost 
 thou image my poor children fainting in sickness, and 
 crying to to their mum-um-ofor," when she came 
 to this passage little Bows buried his face in his blue 
 cotton handkerchief, after crying out " Bravo." 
 
 All the house was affected. Foker, for his part, tak- 
 ing out a large yellow bandanna, wept piteously. As 
 for Pen, he was gone too far for that. He followed 
 the woman about and about when she was off the stage, 
 it and the house were blank ; the lights and the red offi- 
 cers reeled wildly before his sight. He watched her at 
 the side-scenewhere she stood waiting to come on the 
 stage, and where her father took off her shawl: when 
 the reconciliation arrived, and she flung herself down 
 on Mr. Bingley's shoulders, whilst the children clung to 
 their knees, and the Countess (Mrs. Bingley) and Baron 
 Steinforth (performed with great liveliness and spirit 
 by Garbetts,) while the rest of the characters formed 
 a group round them, Pen's hot eyes only saw Fother- 
 ingay, Fotheringay. The curtain fell upon him like a 
 pall. He did not hear a word of what Bingley said, 
 who came forward to announce the play for the next 
 evening, and who took the tumultuous applause, as 
 usual, for himself. Pen was not even distinctly aware
 
 PENDENNIS 61 
 
 that the house was calling for Miss Fotheringay, nor 
 did the manager seem to comprehend that anybody else 
 but himself had caused the success of the play. At last 
 he understood it stepped back with a grin, and pres- 
 ently appeared with Mrs. Haller on his arm. How 
 beautiful she looked! Her hair had fallen down, the 
 officers threw her flowers. She clutched them to her 
 heart. She put back her hair, and smiled all round. 
 Her eyes met Pen's. Down went the curtain again: 
 and she was gone. Not one note could he hear of the 
 overture which the brass band of the dragoons blew by 
 kind permission of Colonel Swallowtail. 
 
 " She is a crusher, ain't she now? " Mr. Foker asked 
 of his companion. 
 
 Pen did not know exactly what Foker said, and 
 answered vaguely. He could not tell the other what 
 he felt; he could not have spoken, just then, to any 
 mortal. Besides, Pendennis did not quite know what 
 he felt yet; it was something overwhelming, mad- 
 dening, delicious; a fever of wild joy and undefined 
 longing. 
 
 And now Rowkins and Miss Thackthwaite came on 
 to dance the favourite double hornpipe, and Foker aban- 
 doned himself to the delights of this ballet, just as he 
 had to the tears of the tragedy, a few minutes before. 
 Pen did not care for it, or indeed think about the dance, 
 except to remember that that woman was acting with 
 her in the scene where she first came in. It was a mist 
 before his eyes. At the end of the dance he looked at his 
 watch and said it was time for him to go. 
 
 " Hang it, stay to see The Bravo of the Battle- Axe," 
 Foker said, " Bingley's splendid in it; he wears red 
 tights, and has to carry Mrs. B. over the Pine-bridge of
 
 62 PENDENNIS 
 
 the Cataract, only she's too heavy. It's great fun, do 
 stop." 
 
 Pen looked at the bill with one lingering fond hope 
 that Miss Fotheringay's name might be hidden, some- 
 where, in the list of the actors of the after-piece, but 
 there was no such name. Go he must. He had a long 
 ride home. He squeezed Foker's hand. He was chok- 
 ing to speak, but he couldn't. He quitted the theatre 
 and walked frantically about the town, he knew not 
 how long; then he mounted at the George and rode 
 homewards, and Clavering clock sang out one as he 
 came into the yard at Fairoaks. The lady of the house 
 might have been awake, but she only heard him from 
 the passage outside his room as he dashed into bed and 
 pulled the clothes over his head. 
 
 Pen had not been in the habit of passing wakeful 
 nights, so he at once fell off into a sound sleep. Even 
 in later days, and with a great deal of care and other 
 thoughtful matter to keep him awake, a man from long 
 practice or fatigue or resolution begins by going to sleep 
 as usual : and gets a nap in advance of Anxiety. But 
 she soon comes up with him and jogs his shoulder, and 
 says " Come, my man, no more of this laziness, you must 
 wake up and have a talk with me." Then they fall to 
 together in the midnight. Well, whatever might after- 
 wards happen to him, poor little Pen was not come to 
 this state yet; he tumbled into a sound sleep did not 
 wake until an early hour in the morning, when the rooks 
 began to caw from the little wood beyond his bed-room 
 windows; and at that very instant and as his eyes 
 started open, the beloved image was in his mind. " My 
 dear boy," he heard her say, " you were in a sound sleep,
 
 PENDENNIS 63 
 
 and I would not disturb you: but I have been close by 
 your pillow all this while: and I don't intend that you 
 shall leave me. I am Love ! I bring with me fever and 
 passion : wild longing, maddening desire ; restless crav- 
 ing and seeking. Many a long day ere this I heard you 
 calling out for me ; and behold now I am come." 
 
 Was Pen frightened at the summons? Not he. He 
 did not know what was coming : it was all wild pleasure 
 and delight as yet. And as, when three years previously, 
 and on entering the fifth form at the Cistercians, his 
 father had made him a present of a gold watch which 
 the boy took from under his pillow and examined on the 
 instant of waking: for ever rubbing and polishing it 
 up in private and retiring into corners to listen to its 
 ticking : so the young man exulted over his new delight ; 
 felt in his waistcoat pocket to see that it was safe ; wound 
 it up at nights, and at the very first moment of waking 
 hugged it and looked at it. By the way, that first watch 
 of Pen's was a showy ill-manufactured piece: it never 
 went well from the beginning, and was always getting 
 out of order. And after putting it aside into a drawer 
 and forgetting it for some time, he swopped it finally 
 away for a more useful time-keeper. 
 
 Pen felt himself to be ever so many years older since 
 yesterday. There was no mistake about it now. He was 
 as much in love as the best hero in the best romance he 
 ever read. He told John to bring his shaving water with 
 the utmost confidence. He dressed himself in some of 
 his finest clothes that morning: and came splendidly 
 down to breakfast, patronising his mother and little 
 Laura, who had been strumming her music lesson for 
 hours before; and who after he had read the prayers (of 
 which he did not heed one single syllable), wondered at
 
 64 PENDENNIS 
 
 his grand appearance, and asked him to tell her what 
 the play was about? 
 
 Pen laughed and declined to tell Laura what the play 
 was about. In fact it was quite as well that she should 
 not know. Then she asked him why he had got on his 
 fine pin and beautiful new waistcoat? 
 
 Pen blushed, and told his mother that the old school- 
 fellow with whom he had dined at Chatteris was reading 
 with a tutor at Baymouth, a very learned man; and as 
 he was himself to go to College, and as there were several 
 young men pursuing their studies at Baymouth he was 
 anxious to ride over and and just see what the course 
 of their reading was. 
 
 Laura made a long face. Helen Pendennis looked 
 hard at her son, troubled more than ever with the vague 
 doubt and terror which had been haunting her ever since 
 the last night, when Farmer Gurnett brought back the 
 news that Pen would not return home to dinner. Ar- 
 thur's eyes defied her. She tried to console herself, and 
 drive off her fears. The boy had never told her an un- 
 truth. Pen conducted himself during breakfast in a 
 very haughty and supercilious manner; and, taking 
 leave of the elder and younger lady, was presently heard 
 riding out of the stable-court. He went gently at first, 
 but galloped like a madman as soon as he thought that 
 he was out of hearing. 
 
 Smirke, thinking of his own affairs, and softly riding 
 with his toes out, to give Pen his three hours' reading at 
 Fairoaks, met his pupil, who shot by him like the wind. 
 Smirke's pony shied, as the other thundered past him; 
 the gentle curate went over his head among the stinging- 
 nettles in the hedge. Pen laughed as they met, pointed 
 towards the Baymouth road, and was gone half-a-mile
 
 The Curate come to Grief
 
 PENDENNIS 65 
 
 in that direction before poor Smirke had picked him- 
 self up. 
 
 Pen had resolved in his mind that he must see Foker 
 that morning; he must hear about her; know about 
 her; be with somebody who knew her; and honest 
 Smirke, for his part, sitting up among the stinging- 
 nettles, as his pony cropped quietly in the hedge, thought 
 dismally to himself, ought he go to Fairoaks now that 
 his pupil was evidently gone away for the day. Yes, he 
 thought he might go, too. He might go and ask Mrs. 
 Pendennis when Arthur would be back ; and hear Miss 
 Laura her Watts's Catechism. He got up on the little 
 pony both were used to his slipping off and advanced 
 upon the house from which his scholar had just rushed 
 away in a whirlwind. 
 
 Thus love makes fools of all of us, big and little ; and 
 the curate had tumbled over head and heels in pursuit 
 of it, and Pen had started in the first heat of the mad 
 race.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 MRS. HALLER AT HOME 
 
 ITHOUT slackening 
 his pace Pen gal- 
 loped on to Bay- 
 mouth, put the mare 
 up at the inn stables, 
 and ran straightway 
 to Mr. Foker's lodg- 
 ^ ings, of whom he 
 had taken the direc- 
 tion on the previous 
 day. On reaching 
 these apartments, 
 which were over a 
 chemist's shop whose 
 stock of cigars and 
 soda-water went off 
 rapidly by the kind 
 patronage of his 
 young inmates, Pen 
 only found Mr. Spavin, Foker's friend, and part owner 
 of the tandem which the latter had driven into Chatteris, 
 who was smoking, and teaching a little dog, a friend of 
 his, tricks with a bit of biscuit. 
 
 Pen's healthy red face fresh from the gallop, com- 
 pared oddly with the waxy debauched little features of 
 Foker's chum; Mr. Spavin remarked the circumstance. 
 
 66
 
 PENDENNIS 67 
 
 ' Who's that man? " he thought, " he looks as fresh as 
 a bean. His hand don't shake of a morning, I'd bet five 
 to one." 
 
 Foker had not come home at all. Here was a dis- 
 appointment! Mr. Spavin could not say when his 
 friend would return. Sometimes he stopped a day, 
 sometimes a week. Of what college was Pen? Would 
 he have anything? There was a very fair tap of ale. 
 Mr. Spavin was enabled to know Pendennis's name, on 
 the card which the latter took out and laid down (per- 
 haps Pen in these days was rather proud of having a 
 card) and so the young men took leave. 
 
 Then Pen went down the rock, and walked about on 
 the sand, biting his nails by the shore of the much-sound- 
 ing sea. It stretched before him bright and immeasur- 
 able. The blue waters came rolling into the bay, 
 foaming and roaring hoarsely: Pen looked them in the 
 face with blank eyes, hardly regarding them. What a 
 tide there was pouring into the lad's own mind at the 
 time, and what a little power had he to check it! Pen 
 flung stones into the sea, but it still kept coming on. 
 He was in a rage at not seeing Foker. He wanted to 
 see Foker. He must see Foker. " Suppose I go on 
 on the Chatteris road, just to see if I can meet him," 
 Pen thought. Rebecca was saddled in another half- 
 hour, and galloping on the grass by the Chatteris road. 
 About four miles from Baymouth, the Clavering road 
 branches off, as everybody knows, and the mare natur- 
 ally was for taking that turn, but, cutting her over the 
 shoulder, Penn passed the turning, and rode on to the 
 turnpike without seeing any sign of the black tandem 
 and red wheels. 
 
 As he was at the turnpike he* might as well go on:
 
 68 PENDENNIS 
 
 that was quite clear. So Pen rode to the George, and 
 the ostler told him that Mr. Foker was there sure 
 enough, and that " he'd been a makin' a tremendous row 
 the night afore, a drinkin' and a singin', and wanting 
 to fight Tom the post-boy: which I'm thinking he'd 
 have had the worst of it," the man added, with a grin. 
 " Have you carried up your master's 'ot water to shave 
 with? " he added, in a very satirical manner, to Mr. 
 Foker's domestic, who here came down the yard bearing 
 his master's clothes, most beautifully brushed and ar- 
 ranged. " Show Mr. Pendennis up to 'un." And Pen 
 followed the man at last to the apartment, where, in the 
 midst of an immense bed, Mr. Harry Foker lay re- 
 posing. 
 
 The feather bed and bolsters swelled up all round Mr. 
 Foker, so that you could hardly see his little sallow face 
 and red silk nightcap. 
 
 "Hullo! "said Pen. 
 
 "Who goes there? brother, quickly tell!" sang out 
 the voice from the bed. 'What! Pendennis again? 
 Is your Mamma acquainted with your absence? Did 
 you sup with us last night? No stop who supped 
 with us last night, Stoopid? " 
 
 " There was the three officers, sir, and Mr. Bingley, 
 sir, and Mr. Costigan, sir," the man answered, who re- 
 ceived all Mr. Foker's remarks with perfect gravity. 
 
 " Ah yes: the cup and merry jest went round. We 
 chanted: and I remember I wanted to fight a post-boy. 
 Did I thrash him, Stoopid? " 
 
 " No, sir. Fight didn't come off, sir," said Stoopid, 
 still with perfect gravity. He was arranging Mr. 
 Foker's dressing-case a trunk, the gift of a fond 
 mother, without which the young fellow never travelled.
 
 PENDENNIS 69 
 
 It contained a prodigious apparatus in plate; a silver 
 dish, a silver mug, silver boxes and bottles for all sorts 
 of essences, and a choice of razors ready against the 
 time when Mr. Foker's beard should come. 
 
 " Do it some other day," said the young fellow, yawn- 
 ing and throwing up his little lean arms over his head. 
 ' ' No, there was no fight; but there was chanting. Bing- 
 ley chanted, I chanted, the General chanted Costigan 
 I mean. Did you ever hear him sing ' The Little Pig 
 under the Bed,' Pen? " 
 
 " The man we met yesterday," said Pen, all in a 
 tremor, " the father of " 
 
 " Of the Fotheringay, the very man. Ain't she a 
 Venus, Pen?" 
 
 " Please, sir, Mr. Costigan's in the sittin'-room, sir, 
 and says, sir, you asked him to breakfast, sir. Called 
 five times, sir; but wouldn't wake you on no account; 
 and has been year since eleven o'clock, sir " 
 
 " How much is it now? " 
 
 " One, sir." 
 
 " What would the best of mothers say," cried the little 
 sluggard, " if she saw me in bed at this hour? She sent 
 me down here with a grinder. She wants me to cultivate 
 my neglected genius He, he! I say, Pen, this isn't 
 quite like seven o'clock school, is it, old boy? " and the 
 young fellow burst out into a boyish laugh of enjoy- 
 ment. Then he added " Go in and talk to the General 
 whilst I dress. And I say, Pendennis, ask him to sing 
 you ' The Little Pig under the Bed;' it's capital." Pen 
 went off in great perturbation, to meet Mr. Costigan, 
 and Mr. Foker commenced his toilet. 
 
 Of Mr. Foker's two grandfathers, the one from whom 
 he inherited a fortune, was a brewer; the other was an
 
 70 PENDENNIS 
 
 earl, who endowed him with the most doting mother in the 
 world. The Fokers had been at the Cistercian school 
 from father to son; at which place, our friend, whose 
 name could be seen over the playground wall, on a pub- 
 lic-house sign, under which " Foker's Entire " was 
 painted, had been dreadfully bullied on account of his 
 trade, his uncomely countenance, his inaptitude for 
 learning and cleanliness, his gluttony and other weak 
 points. But those who know how a susceptible youth, 
 under the tyranny of his schoolfellows, becomes silent and 
 a sneak, may understand how in a very few months after 
 his liberation from bondage, he developed himself as he 
 had done; and became the humorous, the sarcastic, the 
 brilliant Foker, with whom we have made acquaintance. 
 A dunce he always was, it is true ; for learning cannot 
 be acquired by leaving school and entering at college 
 as a fellow-commoner ; but he was now ( in his own pecu- 
 liar manner) as great a dandy as he before had been a 
 slattern, and when he entered his sitting-room to join 
 his two guests, arrived scented and arrayed in fine linen, 
 and perfectly splendid in appearance. 
 
 General or Captain Costigan for the latter was the 
 rank which he preferred to assume was seated in the 
 window with the newspaper held before him at arm's 
 length. The Captain's eyes were somewhat dim; and 
 he was spelling the paper, with the help of his lips, as 
 well as of those bloodshot eyes of his, as you see gentle- 
 men do to whom reading is a rare and difficult occupa- 
 tion. His hat was cocked very much on one ear; and 
 as one of his feet lay up in the window-seat, the observer 
 of such matters might remark, by the size and shabbi- 
 ness of the boots which the Captain wore, that times did 
 not go very well with him. Poverty seems as if it were
 
 PENDENNIS 71 
 
 disposed, before it takes possession of a man entirely, to 
 attack his extremities first: the coverings of his head, 
 feet, and hands, are its first prey. All these parts of the 
 Captain's person were particularly rakish and shabby. 
 As soon as he saw Pen he descended from the window- 
 seat and saluted the new comer, first in a military man- 
 ner, by conveying a couple of his fingers (covered with 
 a broken black glove ) to his hat, and then removing that 
 ornament altogether. The Captain was inclined to be 
 bald, but he brought a quantity of lank iron-grey hair 
 over his pate, and had a couple of wisps of the same 
 falling down on each side of his face. Much whisky 
 had spoiled what complexion Mr. Costigan may have 
 possessed in his youth. His once handsome face had 
 now a copper tinge. He wore a very high stock, scarred 
 and stained in many places; and a dress-coat tightly 
 buttoned up in those parts where the buttons had not 
 parted company from the garment. 
 
 ' The young gentleman to whom I had the honour to 
 be intro juiced yesterday in the Cathedral Yard," said 
 the Captain, with a splendid bow and wave of his hat. 
 " I hope I see you well, sir. I marked ye in the thayater 
 last night during me daughter's perf awrumance ; and 
 missed ye on my return. I did but conduct her home, 
 sir, for Jack Costigan, though poor, is a gentleman ; and 
 when I reintered the house to pay me respects to me joy- 
 ous young friend, Mr. Foker ye "were gone. We had 
 a jolly night of ut, sir Mr. Foker, the three gallant 
 young dragoons, and your 'umble servant. Gad, sir, 
 it put me in mind of one of our old nights when I bore 
 her Majesty's commission in the Foighting Hundtherd 
 and Third." And he pulled out an old snuff-box, which 
 he presented with a stately air to his new acquaintance.
 
 72 PENDENNIS 
 
 Arthur was a great deal too much flurried to speak. 
 This shabby-looking buck was was her father. " I 
 
 hope, Miss F , Miss Costigan is well, sir," Pen said, 
 
 flushing up. " She she gave me greater pleasure, than 
 than I I I ever enjoyed at a play. I think, sir 
 I think she's the finest actress in the world," he gasped 
 out. 
 
 ' Your hand, young man ! for ye speak from your 
 heart," cried the Captain. ' Thank ye, sir, an old soldier 
 and a fond father thanks ye. She is the finest actress in 
 the world. I've seen the Siddons, sir, and the O'Nale 
 They were great, but what were they compared to Miss 
 Fotheringay ? I do not wish she should ashume her own 
 name while on the stage. Me family, sir, are proud peo- 
 ple; and the Costigans of Costiganstown think that an 
 honest man, who has borne her Majesty's colours in the 
 Hundtherd and Third, would demean himself, by per- 
 mitting his daughter to earn her old father's bread." 
 
 1 There cannot be a more honourable duty, surely," 
 Pen said. 
 
 "Honourable! Bedad, sir, I'd like to see the man 
 who said Jack Costigan would consent to anything dis- 
 honourable. I have a heart, sir, though I am poor; I 
 like a man who has a heart. You have: I read it in 
 your honest face and steady eye. And would you be- 
 lieve it?" he added, after a pause, and with a pathetic 
 whisper, " that that Bingley, who has made his fortune 
 by me child, gives her but two guineas a week: out of 
 which she finds herself in dresses, and which, added to 
 me own small means, makes our all? " 
 
 Now the Captain's means were so small as to be, it 
 may be said, quite invisible. But nobody knows how 
 the wind is tempered to shorn Irish lambs, and in what
 
 PENDEXNIS 73 
 
 marvellous places they find pasture. If Captain Costi- 
 gan, whom I had the honour to know, would but have 
 told his history, it would have been a great moral story. 
 But he neither would have told it if he could, nor could 
 if he would ; for the Captain was not only unaccustomed 
 to tell the truth, he was unable even to think it and 
 fact and fiction reeled together in his muzzy, whiskified 
 brain. 
 
 He began life rather brilliantly with a pair of colours, 
 a fine person and legs, and one of the most beautiful 
 voices in the world. To his latest day he sang with ad- 
 mirable pathos and humour, those wonderful Irish bal- 
 lads which are so mirthful and so melancholy: and was 
 always the first himself to cry at their pathos. Poor 
 Cos! he was at once brave and maudlin, humorous and 
 an idiot; always good-natured, and sometimes almost 
 trustworthy. Up to the last day of his life he would 
 drink with any man, and back any man's bill: and his 
 end was in a spunging-house, where the sheriff's officer, 
 who took him, was fond of him. 
 
 In his brief morning of life, Cos formed the delight 
 of regimental messes, and had the honour of singing 
 his songs, bacchanalian and sentimental, at the tables of 
 the most illustrious generals and commanders-in-chief, 
 in the course of which period he drank three times as 
 much claret as was good for him, and spent his doubtful 
 patrimony. What became of him subsequently to his 
 retirement from the army, is no affair of ours. I take 
 it, no foreigner understands the life of an Irish gentle- 
 man without money, the way in which he manages to 
 keep afloat the wind-raising conspiracies in which he 
 engages with heroes as unfortunate as himself the 
 means by which he. contrives, during most days of the
 
 74 PENDENNIS 
 
 week, to get his portion of whisky-and-water : all these 
 are mysteries to us inconceivable: but suffice it to say, 
 that through all the storms of life Jack had floated 
 somehow, and the lamp of his nose had never gone out. 
 
 Before he and Pen had had a half hour's conversation, 
 the Captain managed to extract a couple of sovereigns 
 from the young gentleman for tickets for his daughter's 
 benefit, which was to take place speedily; and was not 
 a bond fide transaction such as that of the last year, when 
 poor Miss Fotheringay had lost fifteen shillings by her 
 venture, but was an arrangement with the manager, by 
 which the lady was to have the sale of a certain number 
 of tickets, keeping for herself a large portion of the sum 
 for which they were sold. 
 
 Pen had but two pounds in his purse, and he handed 
 them over to the Captain for the tickets ; he would have 
 been afraid to offer more lest he should offend the lat- 
 ter's delicacy. Costigan scrawled him an order for a 
 box, lightly slipped the sovereigns into his waistcoat, 
 and slapped his hand over the place where they lay. 
 They seemed to warm his old sides. 
 
 " Faith, sir," said he, " the bullion's scarcer with me 
 than it used to be, as is the case with many a good fellow. 
 I won six hundtherd of 'em in a single night, sir, when 
 me kind friend, His Royal Highness the Duke of Kent, 
 was in Gibralther." 
 
 Then it was good to see the Captain's behaviour at 
 breakfast, before the devilled turkey and the mutton 
 chops! His stories poured forth unceasingly, and his 
 spirits rose as he chatted to the young men. When he 
 got a bit of sunshine, the old lazzarone basked in it; he 
 prated about his own affairs and past splendour, and 
 all the lords, generals, and Lord^Lieutenants he had
 
 PENDENNIS 75 
 
 ever known. He described the death of his darling Bes- 
 sie, the late Mrs. Costigan, and the challenge he had sent 
 to Captain Shanty Clancy, of the Slashers, for looking 
 rude at Miss Fotheringay as she was on her kyar in the 
 Phaynix; and then he described how the Captain apol- 
 ogised, gave a dinner at the Kildare Street, where six 
 of them drank twinty-one bottles of claret, &c. He an- 
 nounced that to sit with two such noble and generous 
 young fellows was the happiness and pride of an old 
 soldier's existence; and having had a second glass of 
 Cura^oa, was so happy that he began to cry. Alto- 
 gether we should say that the Captain was not a man of 
 much strength of mind, or a very eligible companion for 
 youth; but there are worse men, holding much better 
 places in life, and more dishonest, who have never com- 
 mitted half so many rogueries as he. They walked out, 
 the Captain holding an arm of each of his dear young 
 friends, and in a maudlin state of contentment. He 
 winked at one or two tradesmen's shops where, possibly, 
 he owed a bill, as much as to say "See the company I'm 
 in sure I'll pay you, my boy," and they parted finally 
 with Mr. Foker at a billiard-room, where the latter had 
 a particular engagement with some gentlemen of Colo- 
 nel Swallowtail's regiment. 
 
 Pen and the shabby Captain still walked the street 
 together; the Captain, in his sly way, making inquiries 
 about Mr. Foker's fortune and station in life. Pen told 
 him how Foker's father was a celebrated brewer, and 
 his mother was Lady Agnes Milton, Lord Rosherville's 
 daughter. The Captain broke out into a strain of ex- 
 aggerated compliment and panegyric about Mr. Foker, 
 whose " native aristocracie," he said, " could be seen with 
 the twinkling of an oi and only served to adawrun
 
 76 PENDENNIS 
 
 other qualities which he possessed, a foin intellect and 
 a generous heart." 
 
 Pen walked on, listening to his companion's prate, 
 wondering, amused, and puzzled. It had not as yet 
 entered into the boy's head to disbelieve any statement 
 that was made to him ; and being of a candid nature him- 
 self, he took naturally for truth what other people told 
 him. Costigan had never had a better listener, and was 
 highly flattered by the attentiveness and modest bearing 
 of the young man. 
 
 So much pleased was he with the young gentleman, 
 so artless, honest, and cheerful did Pen seem to be, that 
 the Captain finally made him an invitation, which he 
 very seldom accorded to young men, and asked Pen if 
 he would do him the fevor to enter his humble abode, 
 which was near at hand, where the Captain would have 
 the honour of inthro juicing his young friend to his 
 daughter, Miss Fotheringay? 
 
 Pen was so delightfully shocked at this invitation, 
 that he thought he should have dropped from the Cap- 
 tain's arm at first, and trembled lest the other should 
 discover his emotion. He gasped out a few incoherent 
 words, indicative of the high gratification he should have 
 in being presented to the lady for whose for whose 
 talents he had conceived such an admiration such an 
 extreme admiration ; and followed the Captain, scarcely 
 knowing whither that gentleman led him. He was go- 
 ing to see her! He was going to see her! In her was 
 the centre of the universe. She was the kernel of the 
 world for Pen. Yesterday, before he knew her, seemed 
 a period ever so long ago a revolution was between him 
 and that time, and a new world about to begin. 
 
 The Captain conducted his young friend to that quiet
 
 PENDENNIS 77 
 
 little street in Chatteris, called Prior's Lane, which lies 
 close by Dean's Green and the canons' houses, and is 
 overlooked by the enormous towers of the cathedral; 
 there the Captain dwelt modestly in the first floor of a 
 low gabled house, on the door of which was the brass 
 plate of " Creed, Tailor and Robe-maker." Creed was 
 dead, however. His widow was a pew-opener in the 
 cathedral hard by; his eldest son was a little scamp of 
 a choir-boy, who played toss-halfpenny, led his little 
 brothers into mischief, and had a voice as sweet as 
 an angel. A couple of the latter were sitting on the 
 door-step, and they jumped up with great alacrity to 
 meet their lodger, and plunged wildly, and rather to 
 Pen's surprise, at the swallow-tails of the Captain's 
 dresscoat; for the truth is, that the good-natured gen- 
 tleman, when he was in cash, generally brought home 
 an apple, or a piece of gingerbread for these children. 
 ' Whereby the widdy never pressed me for rint when 
 not convanient," as he remarked afterwards to Pen, 
 winking knowingly, and laying a finger on his nose. 
 
 As Pen followed his companion up the creaking old 
 stair, his knees trembled under him. He could hardly 
 see when he entered, following the Captain, and stood in 
 the room in her room. He saw something black before 
 him, and waving as if making a curtsey, and heard, but 
 quite indistinctly, Costigan making a speech over him, 
 in which the Captain, with his usual magniloquence, ex- 
 pressed to " me child " his wish to make her known to 
 " his dear and admirable young friend, Mr. Awther Pin- 
 dinnis, a young gentleman of property in the neighbour- 
 hood, a person of refoined moind, and emiable manners, 
 a sinsare lover of poethry, and a man possest of a feeling 
 and affectionate heart."
 
 78 PENDENNIS 
 
 " It is very fine weather," Miss Fotheringay said, in 
 an Irish accent, and with a deep rich melancholy voice. 
 
 ' Very," said Mr. Pendennis. In this romantic way 
 their conversation began; and he found himself seated 
 on a chair, and having leisure to look at the young lady. 
 
 She looked still handsomer off the stage than before 
 the lamps. All her attitudes were naturally grand and 
 majestical. If she went and stood up against the man- 
 tel-piece her robe draped itself classically round her ; her 
 chin supported itself on her hand, the other lines of her 
 form arranged themselves in full harmonious undula- 
 tions she looked like a muse in contemplation. If she 
 sate down on a cane-bottomed chair, her arm rounded 
 itself over the back of the seat, her hand seemed as if 
 it ought to have a sceptre put into it, the folds of her 
 dress fell naturally round her in order: all her move- 
 ments were graceful and imperial. In the morning you 
 could see her hair was blue-black, her complexion of 
 dazzling fairness, with the faintest possible blush flick- 
 ering, as it were, in her cheek. Her eyes were gray, with 
 prodigious long lashes ; and as for her mouth, Mr. Pen- 
 dennis has given me subsequently to understand, that 
 it was of a staring red colour, with which the most 
 brilliant geranium, sealing-wax, or Guardsman's coat 
 could not vie. 
 
 " And very warm," continued this empress and 
 Queen of Sheba. 
 
 Mr. Pen again assented, and the conversation rolled 
 on in this manner. 'She asked Costigan whether he had 
 had a pleasant evening at the George, and he recounted 
 the supper and the tumblers of punch. Then the father 
 asked her how she had been employing the morning. 
 
 " Bows came," said she, " at ten, and we studied Opha-
 
 PENDENNIS 79 
 
 lia. It's for the twenty-fourth, when I hope, sir, we 
 shall have the honour of seeing ye." 
 
 " Indeed, indeed, you will," Mr. Pendennis cried ; 
 wondering that she could say " Ophalia," and speak 
 with an Irish inflection of voice naturally, who had not 
 
 mt * 
 
 the least Hibernian accent on the stage. 
 
 " I've secured 'um for your benefit, dear," said the 
 Captain, tapping his waistcoat pocket, wherein lay Pen's 
 sovereigns, and winking at Pen, with one eye, at which 
 the boy blushed. 
 
 " Mr. the gentleman's very obleeging," said Mrs. 
 Haller. 
 
 " My name is Pendennis," said Pen, blushing. " I 
 I hope you'll you'll remember it." His heart thumped 
 so as he made this audacious declaration, that he almost 
 choked in uttering it. 
 
 " Pendennis " she answered slowly, and looking him 
 full in the eyes, with a glance so straight, so clear, so 
 bright, so killing, with a voice so sweet, so round, so 
 low, that the word and the glance shot Pen through and 
 through, and perfectly transfixed him with pleasure. 
 
 " I never knew the name was so pretty before," Pen 
 said. 
 
 " 'Tis a very pretty name," Ophelia said. " Pent- 
 weazle's not a pretty name. Remember, papa, when 
 we were on the Norwich Circuit, Young Pentweazle, 
 who used to play second old men, and married Miss 
 Rancy, the Columbine; they're both engaged in Lon- 
 don now, at the Queen's, and get five pounds a week. 
 Pentweazle wasn't his real name. 'Twas Judkin gave 
 it him, I don't know why. His name was Harrington ; 
 that is, his real name was Potts; fawther a clergyman, 
 very respectable. Harrington was in London, and got
 
 80 PENDENNIS 
 
 in debt. Ye remember, he came out in Falkland, to 
 Mrs. Bunce's Julia." 
 
 " And a pretty Julia she was," the Captain inter- 
 posed; " a woman of fifty, and a mother of ten children. 
 'Tis you who ought to have been Julia, or my name's not 
 Jack Costigan." 
 
 " I didn't take the leading business then," Miss Foth- 
 eringay said modestly; "I wasn't fit for't till Bows 
 taught me." 
 
 ' True for you, my dear," said the Captain : and 
 bending to Pendennis, he added, " Re juiced in circum- 
 stances, sir, I was for some time a fencing-master in 
 Dublin; (there's only three men in the empire could 
 touch me with the foil once, but Jack Costigan's get- 
 ting old and stiff now, sir,) and my daughter had an 
 engagement at the thayater there; and 'twas there 
 that my friend, Mr. Bows, gave her lessons, and made 
 her what ye see. What have ye done since Bows went, 
 Emily? " 
 
 " Sure, I've made a pie," Emily said, with perfect 
 simplicity. She pronounced it " Poy." 
 
 " If ye'll try it at four o'clock, sir, say the word," 
 said Costigan gallantly. ' That girl, sir, makes the best 
 veal and ham pie in England, and I think I can promise 
 ye a glass of punch of the right flavour." 
 
 Pen had promised to be home to dinner at six o'clock, 
 but the rascal thought he could accommodate pleasure 
 and duty in this point, and was only too eager to accept 
 this invitation. He looked on with delight and wonder 
 whilst Ophelia busied herself about the room, and pre- 
 pared for the dinner. She arranged the glasses, and 
 laid and smoothed the little cloth, all which duties she 
 performed with a quiet grace and good humour, which
 
 PENDENNIS 81 
 
 enchanted her guest more and more. The " poy " ar- 
 rived from the baker's in the hands of one of the little 
 choir-boy's brothers at the proper hour: and at four 
 o'clock, Pen found himself at dinner actually at din- 
 ner with the handsomest woman in all creation with 
 his first and only love, whom he had adored ever since 
 when? ever since yesterday, ever since for ever. He 
 ate a crust of her making, he poured her out a glass of 
 beer, he saw her drink a glass of punch just one wine- 
 glass full out of the tumbler which she mixed for her 
 papa. She was perfectly good-natured, and offered to 
 mix one for Pendennis too. It was prodigiously strong ; 
 Pen had never in his life drunk so much spirits and 
 water. Was it the punch, or the punch-maker who in- 
 toxicated him? 
 
 Pen tried to engage her in conversation about poetry 
 and about her profession. He asked her what she 
 thought of Ophelia's madness, and whether she was in 
 love with Hamlet or not? " In love with such a little 
 ojus wretch as that stunted manager of a Bingley? " 
 She bristled with indignation at the thought. Pen ex- 
 plained it was not of her he spoke, but of Ophelia of the 
 play. " Oh, indeed ; if no offence was meant, none was 
 taken: but as for Bingley, indeed, she did not value 
 him not that glass of punch." Pen next tried her on 
 Kotzebue. " Kotzebue? who was he? " " The author 
 of the play in which she had been performing so admir- 
 ably." " She did not know that the man's name at the 
 beginning of the book was Thompson," she said. Pen 
 laughed at her adorable simplicity. He told her of the 
 melancholy fate of the author of the play, and how Sand 
 had killed him. It was the first time in her life that Miss 
 Costigan had ever heard of Mr. Kotzebue's existence,
 
 82 PENDENNIS 
 
 but she looked as if she was very much interested, and 
 her sympathy sufficed for honest Pen. 
 
 And in the midst of this simple conversation, the hour 
 and a quarter which poor Pen could afford to allow him- 
 self, passed away only too quickly; and he had taken 
 leave, he was gone, and away on his rapid road home- 
 wards on the back of Rebecca. She was called upon to 
 show her mettle in the three journeys which she made 
 that day. 
 
 ' What was that he was talking about, the madness 
 of Hamlet, and the theory of the great German critic 
 on the subject? " Emily asked of her father. 
 
 " 'Deed then I don't know, Milly dear," answered the 
 Captain. ' We'll ask Bows when he comes." 
 
 " Anyhow, he's a nice, fair-spoken pretty young 
 man," the lady said : " how many tickets did he take of 
 you? " 
 
 " 'Faith, then, he took six, and gev me two guineas, 
 Milly," the Captain said. " I suppose them young chaps 
 is not too flush of coin." 
 
 " He's full of book-learning," Miss Fotheringay con- 
 tinued. ; 'Kotzebue! He, he, what a droll name indeed, 
 now; and the poor fellow killed by Sand, too! Did ye 
 ever hear such a thing? I'll ask Bows about it, papa 
 dear." 
 
 " A queer death, sure enough," ejaculated the Cap- 
 tain, and changed the painful theme. 'Tis an elegant 
 mare the young gentleman rides," Costigan went on to 
 say; " and a grand breakfast, intirely, that young Mis- 
 ter Foker gave us." 
 
 " He's good for two private boxes, and at leest twenty 
 tickets, I should say," cried the daughter, a prudent 
 lass, who always kept her fine eyes on the main chance.
 
 PENDENNIS 83 
 
 "I'll go bail of that," answered the Papa; and so 
 their conversation continued awhile, until the tumbler 
 of punch was finished ; and their hour of departure soon 
 came, too; for at half -past six Miss Fotheringay was 
 to appear at the theatre again, whither her father always 
 
 accompanied her; and stood, as we have seen, in the 
 side-scene watching her, and drank spirits-and-water in 
 the green-room with the company there. 
 
 " How beautiful she is," thought Pen, cantering 
 homewards. " How simple and how tender! How 
 charming it is to see a woman of her genius busying her- 
 self with the humble offices of domestic life, cooking 
 dishes to make her old father comfortable, and brewing
 
 84 PENDENNIS 
 
 him drink! How rude it was of me to begin to talk 
 about professional matters, and how well she turned the 
 conversation! By-the-way, she talked about profes- 
 sional matters herself; but then with what fun and 
 humour she told the story of her comrade, Pentweazle, 
 as he was called ! There is no humour like Irish humour. 
 Her father is rather tedious, but thoroughly amiable; 
 and how fine of him, giving lessons in fencing after he 
 quitted the army, where he was the pet of the Duke of 
 Kent! Fencing! I should like to continue my fencing, 
 or I shall forget what Angelo taught me. Uncle Arthur 
 always liked me to fence he says it is the exercise of 
 a gentleman. Hang it. I'll take some lessons of Cap- 
 tain Costigan. Go along, Rebecca up the hill, old 
 lady. Pendennis, Pendennis how she spoke the word! 
 Emily, Emily! how good, how noble, how beautiful, 
 how perfect, she is ! " 
 
 Now the reader, who has had the benefit of overhear- 
 ing the entire conversation which Pen had with Miss 
 Fotheringay, can judge for himself about the powers 
 of her mind, and may perhaps be disposed to think that 
 she has not said anything astonishingly humorous or 
 intellectual in the course of the above interview. 
 
 But what did our Pen care? He saw a pair of bright 
 eyes, and he believed in them a beautiful image, and he 
 fell down and worshipped it. He supplied the meaning 
 which her words wanted ; and created the divinity which 
 he loved. Was Titania the first who fell in love with an 
 ass, or Pygmalion the only artist who has gone crazy 
 about a stone? He had found her; he had found what 
 his soul thirsted after. He flung himself into the stream 
 and drank with all his might. Let those who have been 
 thirsty own how delicious that first draught is. As he
 
 PENDENNIS 85 
 
 rode down the avenue towards home Pen shrieked with 
 laughter as he saw the Reverend Mr. Smirke once more 
 coming demurely away from Fairoaks on his pony. 
 Smirke had dawdled and stayed at the cottages on the 
 way, and then dawdled with Laura over her lessons and 
 then looked at Mrs. Pendennis's gardens and improve- 
 ments until he had perfectly bored out that lady : and he 
 had taken his leave at the very last minute without that 
 invitation to dinner which he fondly expected. 
 
 Pen was full of kindness and triumph. '* What, 
 picked up and sound? " he cried out laughing. " Come 
 along back, old fellow, and eat my dinner I have had 
 mine : but we will have a bottle of the old wine and drink 
 her health, Smirke." 
 
 Poor Smirke turned the pony's head round, and 
 jogged along with Arthur. His mother was charmed to 
 see him in such high spirits, and welcomed Mr. Smirke 
 for his sake, when Arthur said he had forced the curate 
 back to dine. He gave a most ludicrous account of the 
 play of the night before, and of the acting of Bingley 
 the Manager, in his ricketty Hessians, and the enormous 
 Mrs. Bingley as the Countess, in rumpled green satin 
 and a Polish cap: he mimicked them, and delighted his 
 mother and little Laura, who clapped her hands with 
 pleasure. 
 
 " And Mrs. Haller? " said Mrs. Pendennis. 
 
 " She's a stunner, ma'am," Pen said, laughing, and 
 using the words of his revered friend, Mr. Foker. 
 
 " A what, Arthur? " asked the lady. 
 
 ' What is a stunner, Arthur? " cried Laura, in the 
 same voice. 
 
 So he gave them a queer account of Mr. Foker, and 
 how he used to be called Vats and Grains, and bv other
 
 86 PENDENNIS 
 
 contumelious names at school: and how he was now 
 exceedingly rich, and a Fellow Commoner at St. Boni- 
 face. But gay and communicative as he was, Mr. Pen 
 did not say one syllable about his ride to Chatteris that 
 day, or about the new friends whom he had made there. 
 
 When the two ladies retired, Pen, with flashing eyes, 
 filled up two great bumpers of Madeira, and looking 
 Smirke full in the face said, " Here's to her! " 
 
 " Here's to her," said the curate with a sigh, lifting 
 the glass: and emptying it, so that his face was a little 
 pink when he put it down. 
 
 Pen had even less sleep that night than on the night 
 before. In the morning, and almost before dawn, he 
 went out and saddled that unfortunate Rebecca himself, 
 and rode her on the Downs like mad. Again Love had 
 roused him and said, " Awake, Pendennis, I am here." 
 That charming fever that delicious longing and fire, 
 and uncertainty; he hugged them to him he would not 
 have lost them for all the world.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 CONTAINS BOTH LOVE AND WAS. 
 
 ICERO and Eu- 
 ripides did not 
 occupy Mr. Pen 
 much for some 
 time after this, 
 and honest Mr. 
 Smirke had 
 
 a very easy 
 time with 
 his pupil. 
 Rebecca was 
 the animal 
 who suffer- 
 ed most in 
 the present 
 
 state of Pen's mind, for, besides those days when he could 
 publicly announce his intention of going to Chatteris to 
 take a fencing-lesson, and went thither with the know- 
 ledge of his mother, whenever he saw three hours clear 
 before him, the young rascal made a rush for the city, 
 and found his way to Prior's Lane. He was as frantic 
 with vexation when Rebecca went lame, as Richard at 
 Bosworth, when his horse was killed under him: and 
 got deeply into the books of the man who kept the hunt- 
 ing stables at Chatteris for the doctoring of his own, and 
 the hire of another animal. 
 
 87
 
 88 PENDENNIS 
 
 Then, and perhaps once in a week, under pre- 
 tence of going to read a Greek play with Smirke, this 
 young reprobate set off so as to be in time for the Com- 
 petitor down coach, stayed a couple of hours in Chat- 
 teris, and returned on the Rival, which left for London 
 at ten at night. Once his secret was nearly lost by 
 Smirke's simplicity, of whom Mrs. Pendennis asked 
 whether they had read a great deal the night before, or 
 a question to that effect. Smirke was about to tell the 
 truth, that he had never seen Mr. Pen at all, when the 
 latter's boot-heel came grinding down on Mr. Smirke's 
 toe under the table, and warned the curate not to betray 
 him. 
 
 They had had conversations on the tender subject of 
 course. There must be a confidant and depositary some- 
 where. When informed, under the most solemn vows 
 of secrecy, of Pen's condition of mind, the curate said, 
 with no small tremor, " that he hoped it was no unworthy 
 object no unlawful attachment, which Pen had 
 formed " for if so, the poor fellow felt it would be his 
 duty to break his vow and inform Pen's mother, and 
 then there would be a quarrel, he felt, with sickening 
 apprehension, and he would never again have a chance 
 of seeing what he most liked in the world. 
 
 " Unlawful, unworthy! " Pen bounced out at the cu- 
 rate's question. " She is as pure as she is beautiful; I 
 would give my heart to no other woman. I keep the 
 matter a secret in my family, because because there 
 are reasons of a weighty nature which I am not at liberty 
 to disclose. But any man who breathes a word against 
 her purity insults both her honour and mine, and and 
 dammy, I won't stand it." 
 
 Smirke, with a faint laugh, only said, " Well, well,
 
 PENDENNIS 89 
 
 don't call me out, Arthur, for you know I can't fight: " 
 but by this compromise the wretched curate was put 
 more than ever into the power of his pupil, and the Greek 
 and mathematics suffered correspondingly. 
 
 If the reverend gentleman had had much discern- 
 ment, and looked into the Poets' corner of the County 
 Chronicle, as it arrived in the Wednesday's bag, he 
 might have seen " Mrs. Haller," " Passion and Genius," 
 " Lines to Miss Fotheringay, of the Theatre Royal," 
 appearing every week; and other verses of the most 
 gloomy, thrilling, and passionate cast. But as these 
 poems were no longer signed NEP by their artful com- 
 poser, but subscribed EROS, neither the tutor nor 
 Helen, the good soul, who cut all her son's verses out of 
 the paper, knew that Nep was no other than that flam- 
 ing Eros, who sang so vehemently the charms of the new 
 actress. 
 
 " Who is the lady," at last asked Mrs. Pendennis, 
 " whom your rival is always singing in the County 
 Chronicle? He writes something like you, dear Pen, 
 but yours is much the best. Have you seen Miss Foth- 
 eringay? " 
 
 Pen said yes, he had; that night he went to see the 
 " Stranger," she acted Mrs. Haller. By the way she 
 was going to have a benefit, and was to appear in Ophe- 
 liasuppose we were to go Shakspeare you know, 
 mother we can get horses from the Clavering Arms. 
 Little Laura sprang up with delight, she longed for a 
 play. 
 
 Pen introduced " Shakspeare you know," because the 
 deceased Pendennis, as became a man of his character, 
 professed an uncommon respect for the bard of Avon, 
 in whose works he safely said there was more poetry
 
 90 PENDENNIS 
 
 than in all " Johnson's Poets " put together. And 
 though Mr. Pendennis did not much read the works in 
 question, yet he enjoined Pen to peruse them, and often 
 said what pleasure he should have, when the boy was 
 of a proper age, in taking him and mother to see some 
 good plays of the immortal poet. 
 
 The ready tears welled up in the kind mother's eyes 
 as she remembered these speeches of the man who was 
 gone. She kissed her son fondly, and said she would 
 go. Laura jumped for joy. Was Pen happy? was 
 he ashamed? As he held his mother to him, he longed 
 to tell her all, but he kept his counsel. He would see 
 how his mother liked her ; the play should be the thing, 
 and he would try his mother like Hamlet's. 
 
 Helen, in her good humour, asked Mr. Smirke to be 
 of the party. That ecclesiastic had been bred up by 
 a fond parent at Clapham, who had an objection to dra- 
 matic entertainments, and he had never yet seen a play. 
 But, Shakspeare! but to go with Mrs. Pendennis in 
 her carriage, and sit a whole night by her side! he could 
 not resist the idea of so much pleasure, and made a 
 feeble speech, in which he spoke of temptation and grat- 
 itude, and finally accepted Mrs. Pendennis's most kind 
 offer. As he spoke he gave her a look, which made her 
 exceedingly uncomfortable. She had seen that look 
 more than once, of late, pursuing her. He became more 
 positively odious every day in the widow's eyes. 
 
 We are not going to say a great deal about Pen's 
 courtship of Miss Fotheringay, for the reader has al- 
 ready had a specimen of her conversation, much of 
 which need surely not be reported. Pen sate with her 
 hour after hour, and poured forth all his honest boyish
 
 PENDENNIS 91 
 
 soul to her. Everything he knew, or hoped, or felt, or 
 had read, or fancied, he told to her. He never tired of 
 talking and longing. One after another, as his thoughts 
 rose in his hot eager brain, he clothed them in words, and 
 told them to her. Her part of the tete-a-tete was not 
 to talk, but to appear as if she understood what Pen 
 talked, and to look exceedingly handsome and sympa- 
 thising. The fact is, whilst he was making one of his 
 tirades, the lovely Emily, who could not comprehend a 
 tenth part of his talk, had leisure to think about her 
 own affairs, and would arrange in her own mind how 
 they should dress the cold mutton, or how she would 
 turn the black satin, or make herself out of her scarf a 
 bonnet like Miss Thackthwaite's new one, and so forth. 
 Pen spouted Byron and Moore ; passion and poetry : her 
 business was to throw up her eyes, or fixing them for a 
 moment on his face, to cry, " Oh, 'tis beautiful! Ah, 
 how exquisite ! Repeat those lines again." And off the 
 boy went, and she returned to her own simple thoughts 
 about the turned gown, or the hashed mutton. 
 
 In fact Pen's passion was not long a secret from the 
 lovely Emily or her father. Upon his second visit, his 
 admiration was quite evident to both of them, and on 
 his departure the old gentleman said to his daughter, as 
 he winked at her over his glass of grog, " Faith, Milly 
 darling, I think ye've hooked that chap." 
 
 " Pooh, 'tis only a boy, papa dear," Milly remarked. 
 " Sure he's but a child." 
 
 " Ye've hooked 'um anyhow," said the Captain, " and 
 let me tell ye he's not a bad fish. I asked Tom at the 
 George, and Flint, the grocer, where his mother dales 
 fine fortune drives in her chariot splendid park and 
 grounds Fairoaks Park only son property all his
 
 92 PENDENNIS 
 
 own at twenty-one ye might go further and not fare 
 so well, Miss Fotheringay." 
 
 " Them boys are mostly talk," said Milly seriously. 
 " Ye know at Dublin how ye went on about young Pol- 
 doody, and I've a whole desk full of verses he wrote me 
 when he was in Trinity College; but he went abroad, 
 and his mother married him to an Englishwoman." 
 
 " Lord Poldoody was a young nobleman ; and in them 
 it's natural: and ye weren't in the position in which ye 
 are now, Milly dear. But ye mustn't encourage this 
 young chap too much, for, bedad, Jack Costigan won't 
 have any thrifling with his daughter." 
 
 " No more will his daughter, papa, you may be sure 
 of that" Milly said. "A little sip more of the punch, 
 sure, 'tis beautiful. Ye needn't be afraid about the 
 young chap I think I'm old enough to take care of 
 myself, Captain Costigan." 
 
 So Pen used to come day after day, rushing in and 
 galloping away, and growing more wild about the girl 
 with every visit. Sometimes the Captain was present 
 at their meetings; but having a perfect confidence in 
 his daughter, he was more often inclined to leave the 
 young couple to themselves, and cocked his hat over his 
 eye, and strutted off on some errand when Pen entered. 
 How delightful those interviews were! The Captain's 
 drawing-room was a low wainscotted room, with a large 
 window looking into the Dean's garden. There Pen 
 sate and talked and talked to Emily, looking beauti- 
 ful as she sate at her work looking beautiful and calm, 
 and the sunshine came streaming in at the great win- 
 dows, and lighted up her superb face and form. In the 
 midst of the conversation, the great bell would begin to 
 boom, and he would pause smiling, and be silent until
 
 PENDENNIS 93 
 
 the sound of the vast music died away or the rooks in 
 the cathedral elms would make a great noise towards 
 sunset or the sound of the organ and the choristers 
 would come over the quiet air, and gently hush Pen's 
 talking. 
 
 By the way, it must be said, that Miss Fotheringay, 
 in a plain shawl and a close bonnet and veil, went to 
 church every Sunday of her life, accompanied by her 
 indefatigable father, who gave the responses in a very 
 rich and fine brogue, joined in the psalms and chanting, 
 and behaved in the most exemplary manner. 
 
 Little Bows, the house-friend of the family, was ex- 
 ceedingly wroth at the notion of Miss Fotheringay's 
 marriage with a stripling seven or eight years her junior. 
 Bows, who was a cripple, and owned that he was a little 
 more deformed even than Bingley the manager, so that 
 he could not appear on the stage, was a singular wild 
 man of no small talents and humour. Attracted first 
 by Miss Fotheringay's beauty, he began to teach her 
 how to act. He shrieked out in his cracked voice the 
 parts, and his pupil learned them from his lips by rote, 
 and repeated them in her full rich tones. He indicated 
 the attitudes, and set and moved those beautiful arms 
 of hers. Those who remember this grand actress on the 
 stage can recal how she used always precisely the same 
 gestures, looks, and tones; how she stood on the same 
 plank of the stage in the same position, rolled her eyes 
 at the same instant and to the same degree, and wept 
 with precisely the same heart-rending pathos and over 
 the same pathetic syllable. And after she had come out 
 trembling with emotion before the audience, and look- 
 ing so exhausted and tearful that you fancied she would 
 faint with sensibility, she would gather up her hair the
 
 94 PENDENNIS 
 
 instant she was behind the curtain, and go home to a 
 mutton chop and a glass of brown stout; and the har- 
 rowing labours of the day over, she went to bed and 
 snored as resolutely and as regularly as a porter. 
 
 Bows then was indignant at the notion that his pupil 
 should throw her chances away in life by bestowing her 
 hand upon a little country squire. As soon as a London 
 manager saw her he prophesied that she would get a 
 London engagement, and a great success. The misfor- 
 tune was that the London managers had seen her. She 
 had played in London three years before, and had failed 
 from utter stupidity. Since then it was that Bows had 
 taken her in hand and taught her part after part. How 
 he worked and screamed, and twisted, and repeated lines 
 over and over again, and with what indomitable patience 
 and dullness she followed him ! She knew that he made 
 her: and let herself be made. She was not grateful, or 
 ungrateful, or unkind, or ill humoured. She was only 
 stupid ; and Pen was madly in love with her. 
 
 The post-horses from the Clavering Arms arrived in 
 due time, and carried the party to the theatre at Chat- 
 teris, where Pen was gratified in perceiving that a tol- 
 erably large audience was assembled. The young 
 gentlemen from Baymouth had a box, in the front of 
 which sate Mr. Foker and his friend Mr. Spavin splen- 
 didly attired in the most full-blown evening costume. 
 They saluted Pen in a cordial manner, and examined his 
 party, of which they approved, for little Laura was a 
 pretty little red-cheeked girl with a quantity of shining 
 brown ringlets, and Mrs. Pendennis dressed in black 
 velvet with the diamond cross which she sported on great 
 occasions, looked uncommonly handsome and majestic. 
 Behind these sate Mr. Arthur, and the gentle Smirke
 
 PENDENNIS 95 
 
 with the curl reposing on his fair forehead, and his white 
 tie in perfect order. He blushed to find himself in such 
 a place but how happy was he to be there. He and 
 Mrs. Pendennis brought books of " Hamlet " with them 
 to follow the tragedy, as is the custom of honest country- 
 folks who go to a play in state. Samuel, coachman, 
 groom, and gardener to Mrs. Pendennis, took his place 
 in the pit, where Mr. Foker's man was also visible. It 
 was dotted with non-commissioned officers of the Dra- 
 goons, whose band, by kind permission of Colonel Swal- 
 lowtail, were, as usual, in the orchestra ; and that corpu- 
 lent and distinguished warrior himself, with his Waterloo 
 medal and a number of his young men, made a hand- 
 some show in the boxes. 
 
 ' Who is that odd-looking person bowing to you, Ar- 
 thur? " Mrs. Pendennis asked of her son. 
 
 Pen blushed a great deal. " His name is Captain 
 Costigan, ma'am," he said " a Peninsular officer." In 
 fact it was the Captain in a new shoot of clothes, as he 
 called them, and with a large pair of white kid gloves, 
 one of which he waved to Pendennis, whilst he laid the 
 other sprawling over his heart and coat-buttons. Pen 
 did not say any more. And how was Mrs. Pendennis 
 to know that Mr. Costigan was the father of Miss Foth- 
 eringay? 
 
 Mr. Hornbull, from London, was the Hamlet of the 
 night, Mr. Bingley modestly contenting himself with 
 the part of Horatio, and reserving his chief strength for 
 William in " Black-eyed Susan," which was the second 
 piece. 
 
 We have nothing to do with the play: except to say, 
 that Ophelia looked lovely, and performed with admir- 
 able wild pathos: laughing, weeping, gazing wildly,
 
 96 PENDENNIS 
 
 waving her beautiful white arms, and flinging about her 
 snatches of flowers and songs with the most charming 
 madness. What an opportunity her splendid black hair 
 had of tossing over her shoulders! She made the most 
 charming corpse ever seen; and while Hamlet and 
 Laertes were battling in her grave, she was looking out 
 from the back scenes with some curiosity towards Pen's 
 box, and the family party assembled in it. 
 
 There was but one voice in her praise there. Mrs. 
 Pendennis was in ecstacies with her beauty. Little 
 Laura was bewildered by the piece, and the Ghost, and 
 the play within the play (during which, as Hamlet lay 
 at Ophelia's knee, Pen felt that he would have liked to 
 strangle Mr. Hornbull ) , but cried out great praises of 
 that beautiful young creature. Pen was charmed with 
 the effect which she produced on his mother and the 
 clergyman, for his part, was exceedingly enthusiastic. 
 
 When the curtain fell upon that group of slaughtered 
 personages, who are dispatched so suddenly at the end 
 of " Hamlet," and whose demise astonished poor little 
 Laura not a little, there was an immense shouting and 
 applause from all quarters of the house; the intrepid 
 Smirke, violently excited, clapped his hands, and cried 
 out " Bravo, Bravo," as loud as the Dragoon officers 
 themselves. These were greatly moved, its s'agitaient 
 sur leurs banes, io borrow a phrase from our neigh- 
 bours. They were led cheering into action by the portly 
 Swallowtail, who waved his cap the non-commissioned 
 officers in the pit, of course, gallantly following their 
 chiefs. There was a roar of bravos rang through the 
 house ; Pen bellowing with the loudest. " Fotheringay ! 
 Fotheringay! " Messrs. Spavin and Foker giving the 
 view halloo from their box. Even Mrs. Pendennis be-
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 97 
 
 gan to wave about her pocket-handkerchief, and little 
 Laura danced, laughed, clapped, and looked up at Pen 
 with wonder. 
 
 Hornbull led the beneficiaire forward, amidst bursts 
 of enthusiasm and she looked so handsome and radiant, 
 with her hair still over her shoulders, that Pen hardly 
 
 could contain himself for rapture: and he leaned over 
 his mother's chair, and shouted, and hurrayed, and waved 
 his hat. It was all he could do to keep his secret from 
 Helen, and not say, " Look! That's the woman! Isn't 
 she peerless? I tell you I love her." But he disguised 
 these feelings under an enormous bellowing and hurray- 
 ing. 
 
 As for Miss Fotheringay and her behaviour, the 
 reader is referred to a former page for an account of
 
 98 PENDENNIS 
 
 that. She went through precisely the same business. 
 She surveyed the house all round with glances of grati- 
 tude ; and trembled, and almost sank with emotion, over 
 her favourite trap-door. She seized the flowers ( Foker 
 discharged a prodigious bouquet at her, and even Smirke 
 made a feeble shy with a rose, and blushed dreadfully 
 when it fell into the pit) she seized the flowers and 
 pressed them to her swelling heart &c., &c. in a 
 word we refer the reader to page 57. Twinkling 
 in her breast poor old Pen saw a locket which he had 
 bought of Mr. Nathan in High Street, with the last shil- 
 ling he was worth, and a sovereign borrowed from 
 Smirke. 
 
 " Black -eyed Susan " followed, at which sweet story 
 our gentle-hearted friends were exceedingly charmed 
 and affected: and in which Susan, with a russet gown 
 and a pink ribbon in her cap, looked to the full as lovely 
 as Ophelia. Bingley was great in William. Goll, as 
 the Admiral, looked like the figure-head of a seventy- 
 four; and Garbetts, as Captain Boldweather, a miscre- 
 ant who forms a plan for carrying off Black-eyed Susan, 
 and waving an immense cocked hat, says, " Come what 
 may, he will be the ruin of her " all these performed 
 their parts with their accustomed talent ; and it was with 
 a sincere regret that all our friends saw the curtain drop 
 down and end that pretty and tender story. 
 
 If Pen had been alone with his mother in the carriage 
 as they went home, he would have told her all that night ; 
 but he sate on the box in the moonshine smoking a cigar 
 by the side of Smirke, who warmed himself with a com- 
 forter. Mr. Foker's tandem and lamps whirled by the 
 sober old Clavering posters, as they were a couple of 
 miles on their road home, and Mr. Spavin saluted Mrs.
 
 PENDENNIS 99 
 
 Pendennis's carriage with some considerable variations 
 of Rule Britannia on the key-bugle. 
 
 It happened two days after the above gaieties that the 
 Dean of Chatteris entertained a few select clerical 
 friends at dinner at his Deanery House. That they 
 drank uncommonly good port wine, and abused the 
 Bishop over their dessert, are very likely matters: but 
 with such we have nothing at present to do. Our friend 
 Doctor Portman of Clavering, was one of the Dean's 
 guests, and being a gallant man, and seeing from his 
 place at the mahogany, the Dean's lady walking up and 
 down the grass, with her children sporting around her, 
 and her pink parasol over her lovely head the Doctor 
 stept out of the French windows of the dining-room into 
 the lawn, which skirts that apartment, and left the other 
 white neck-cloths to gird at my Lord Bishop. Then the 
 Doctor went up and offered Mrs. Dean his arm, and 
 they sauntered over the ancient velvet lawn, which had 
 been mowed and rolled for immemorial Deans, in that 
 easy, quiet, comfortable manner, in which people of 
 middle age and good temper walk after a good dinner, 
 in a calm golden summer evening, when the sun has but 
 just sunk behind the enormous cathedral towers, and 
 the sickle-shaped moon is growing every instant brighter 
 in the heavens. 
 
 Now at the end of the Dean's garden, there is, as we 
 have stated, Mrs. Creed's house, and the windows of the 
 first-floor room were open to admit the pleasant sum- 
 mer air. A young lady of six-and-twenty, whose eyes 
 were perfectly wide open, and a luckless boy of eighteen, 
 blind with love and infatuation, were in that chamber 
 together ; in which persons, as we. have before seen them
 
 100 PENDENNIS 
 
 in the same place, the reader will have no difficulty in 
 recognising Mr. Arthur Pendennis and Miss Costigan. 
 
 The poor boy had taken the plunge. Trembling with 
 passionate emotion, his heart beating and throbbing 
 fiercely, tears rushing forth in spite of him, his voice al- 
 most choking with feeling, poor Pen had said those 
 words which he could withhold no more, and flung him- 
 self and his whole store of love, and admiration, and 
 ardour, at the feet of this mature beauty. Is he the first 
 who has done so ? Have none before or after him staked 
 all their treasure of life, as a savage does his land and 
 possessions against a draught of the fair-skins' fire- 
 water, or a couple of bauble eyes? 
 
 " Does your mother know of this, Arthur? " said Miss 
 Fotheringay, slowly. He seized her hand madly and 
 kissed it a thousand times. She did not withdraw it. 
 "Does the old lady know it?" Miss Costigan thought 
 to herself " well, perhaps she may," and then she re- 
 membered what a handsome diamond cross Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis had on the night of the play, and thought, " sure 
 'twill go in the family." 
 
 " Calm yourself, dear Arthur," she said, in her low 
 rich voice, and smiled sweetly and gravely upon him. 
 Then with her disengaged hand, she put the hair lightly 
 off his throbbing forehead. He was in such a rapture 
 and whirl of happiness that he could hardly speak. At 
 last he gasped out, " My mother has seen you and ad- 
 mires you beyond measure. She will learn to love you 
 soon: who can do otherwise? She will love you because 
 I do." 
 
 ' 'Deed then, I think you do," said Miss Costigan, 
 perhaps with a sort of pity for Pen. 
 
 Think she did I Of course here Mr. Pen went off into
 
 
 A view from the Dean's Garden
 
 PENDENNIS 101 
 
 a rhapsody which, as we have perfect command over our 
 own feelings, we have no right to overhear. Let the 
 poor boy fling out his simple heart at the woman's feet, 
 and deal gently with him. It is best to love wisely, no 
 doubt : but to love foolishly is better than not to be able 
 to love at all. Some of us can't : and are proud of our 
 impotence too. 
 
 At the end of his speech, Pen again kissed the impe- 
 rial hand with rapture and I believe it was at this very 
 moment, and while Mrs. Dean and Doctor Portman 
 were engaged in conversation, that young Master Rid- 
 ley Roset, her son, pulled his mother by the back of her 
 capacious dress and said 
 
 " I say, ma! look up there " and he waggled his in- 
 nocent head. 
 
 That was, indeed, a view from the Dean's garden such 
 as seldom is seen by Deans or is written in Chapters. 
 There was poor Pen performing a salute upon the rosy 
 fingers of his charmer, who received the embrace with 
 perfect calmness and good-humour. Master Ridley 
 looked up and grinned, little Miss Rosa looked at her 
 brother, and opened the mouth of astonishment. Mrs. 
 Dean's countenance defied expression, and as for Dr. 
 Portman, when he beheld the scene, and saw his prime 
 favourite and dear pupil Pen, he stood mute with rage 
 and wonder. 
 
 Mrs. Haller spied the party below at the same mo- 
 ment, and gave a start and a laugh. " Sure there's some- 
 body in the Dean's garden," she cried out; and with- 
 drew with perfect calmness, whilst Pen darted away 
 with his face glowing like coals. The garden party had 
 re-entered the house when he ventured to look out again. 
 The sickle moon was blazing bright in the heavens then,
 
 102 PENDENNIS 
 
 the stars were glittering, the bell of the cathedral tolling 
 nine, the Dean's guests (all save one, who had called for 
 his horse Dumpling, and ridden off early) were par- 
 taking of tea and buttered cakes in Mrs. Dean's draw- 
 ing-room when Pen took leave of Miss Costigan. 
 
 Pen arrived at home in due time afterwards, and was 
 going to slip off to bed, for the poor lad was greatly 
 worn and agitated, and his high-strung nerves had 
 been at almost a maddening pitch when a summons 
 came to him by John the old footman, whose counte- 
 nance bore a very ominous look, that his mother must see 
 him below. 
 
 On this he tied on his neck-cloth again, and went down 
 stairs to the drawing-room. There sate not only his 
 mother, but her friend, the Reverend Doctor Portman. 
 Helen's face looked very pale by the light of the lamp 
 the Doctor's was flushed, on the contrary, and quivering 
 with anger and emotion. 
 
 Pen saw at once that there was a crisis, and that there 
 had been a discovery. " Now for it," he thought. 
 
 ' Where have you been, Arthur? " Helen said in a 
 trembling voice. 
 
 " How can you look that that dear lady, and a Chris- 
 tian clergyman in the face, sir? " bounced out the Doc- 
 tor, in spite of Helen's pale, appealing looks. ' Where 
 has he been? Where his mother's son should have been 
 ashamed to go. For your mother's an angel, sir, an 
 angel. How dare you bring pollution into her house, 
 and make that spotless creature wretched with the 
 thoughts of your crime? " 
 
 "Sir!" said Pen. 
 
 " Don't deny it, sir," roared the Doctor. " Don't add 
 lies, sir, to your other infamy. I saw you myself, sir.
 
 PENDENNIS 103 
 
 I saw you from the Dean's garden. I saw you kissing 
 the hand of that infernal painted " 
 
 " Stop," Pen said, clapping his fist on the table, till 
 the lamp flickered up and shook, " I am a very young 
 man, but you will please to remember that I am a gentle- 
 man I will hear no abuse of that lady." 
 
 " Lady, sir," cried the Doctor, " that a lady you 
 you you stand in your mother's presence and call that 
 that woman a lady! " 
 
 " In anybody's presence," shouted out Pen. " She is 
 worthy of any place. She is as pure as any woman. She 
 is as good as she is beautiful. If any man but you in- 
 sulted her, I would tell him what I thought ; but as you 
 are my oldest friend, I suppose you have the privilege 
 to doubt of my honour." 
 
 " No, no, Pen, dearest Pen," cried out Helen in an 
 excess of joy. " I told, I told you, Doctor, he was not 
 not what you thought : " and the tender creature coming 
 trembling forward flung herself on Pen's shoulder. 
 
 Pen felt himself a man, and a match for all the Doc- 
 tors in Doctordom. He was glad this explanation had 
 come. * You saw how beautiful she was," he said to 
 his mother, with a soothing, protecting air, like Hamlet 
 with Gertrude in the play. " I tell you, dear mother, 
 she is as good. When you know her you will say so. 
 She is of all, except you, the simplest, the kindest, the 
 most affectionate of women. Why should she not be 
 on the stage? She maintains her father by her labour." 
 
 " Drunken old reprobate," growled the Doctor, but 
 Pen did not hear or heed. 
 
 " If you could see, as I have, how orderly her life is, 
 how pure and pious her whole conduct, you would as 
 I do yes, as I do " (with a savage look at the Doctor)
 
 104 PENDENNIS 
 
 " spurn the slanderer who dared to do her wrong. 
 Her father was an officer, and distinguished himself in 
 Spain. He was a friend of His Royal Highness the 
 Duke of Kent, and is intimately known to the Duke of 
 Wellington, and some of the first officers of our army. 
 He has met my uncle Arthur at Lord Hill's, he thinks. 
 His own family is one of the most ancient and respect- 
 able in Ireland, and indeed is as good as our own. The 
 the Costigans, were kings of Ireland." 
 
 4 Why, God bless my soul," shrieked out the Doctor, 
 hardly knowing whether to burst with rage or laughter, 
 " you don't mean to say you want to marry her? " 
 
 Pen put on his most princely air. ' What else, Dr. 
 Portman," he said, " do you suppose would be my de- 
 sire?" 
 
 Utterly foiled in his attack, and knocked down by this 
 sudden lunge of Pen's, the Doctor could only gasp out, 
 " Mrs. Pendennis, ma'am, send for the Major." 
 
 " Send for the Major? with all my heart," said Ar- 
 thur, Prince of Pendennis and Grand Duke of Fair- 
 oaks, with a most superb wave of the hand. And the 
 colloquy terminated by the writing of those two letters 
 which were laid on Major Pendennis's breakfast-table, 
 in London, at the commencement of Prince Arthur's 
 most veracious history.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 IN WHICH THE MAJOE MAKES HIS APPEARANCE 
 
 UR acquaintance, Major 
 . Arthur Pendennis, ar- 
 rived in due time at Fair- 
 oaks, after a dreary night 
 passed in the mail-coach, 
 where a stout fellow-pas- 
 senger, swelling preter- 
 naturally with great- 
 coats, had crowded him 
 into a corner, and kept 
 him awake by snoring indecently; where a widow 
 lady, opposite, had not only shut out the fresh 
 air by closing all the windows of the vehicle, but had 
 filled the interior with fumes of Jamaica rum and water, 
 which she sucked perpetually from a bottle in her reti- 
 cule; where, whenever he caught a brief moment of 
 sleep, the twanging of the horn at the turnpike gates, 
 or the scuffling of his huge neighbour wedging him 
 closer and closer, or the play of the widow's feet on his 
 own tender toes, speedily woke up the poor gentleman 
 to the horrors and realities of life a life which has 
 passed away now, and become impossible, and only lives 
 in fond memories. Eight miles an hour, for twenty or 
 five-and-twenty hours, a tight mail-coach, a hard seat, 
 a gouty tendency, a perpetual change of coachmen 
 grumbling because you did not fee them enough, a fel- 
 
 105
 
 106 PENDENNIS 
 
 low-passenger partial to spirits-and-water, who has 
 not borne these evils in the jolly old times? and how 
 could people travel under such difficulties? And yet 
 they did. Night and morning passed, and the Major, 
 with a yellow face, a bristly beard, a wig out of curl, 
 and strong rheumatic griefs shooting through various 
 limbs of his uneasy body, descended at the little lodge- 
 gate at Fairoaks, where the porteress and gardener's 
 wife reverentially greeted him; and, still more respect- 
 fully, Mr. Morgan, his man. 
 
 Helen was on the look-out for this expected guest, 
 and saw him from her window. But she did not come 
 forward immediately to greet him. She knew the Major 
 did not like to be seen at a surprise, and required a little 
 preparation before he cared to be visible. Pen, when a 
 boy, had incurred sad disgrace, by carrying off from the 
 Major's dressing-table a little morocco box, which it 
 must be confessed contained the Major's back teeth, 
 which he naturally would leave out of his jaws in a jolt- 
 ing mail-coach, and without which he would not choose 
 to appear. Morgan, his man, made a mystery of mys- 
 tery of his wigs : curling them in private places : intro- 
 ducing them privily to his master's room; nor without 
 his head of hair would the Major care to show himself to 
 any member of his family, or any acquaintance. He 
 went to his apartment then and supplied these deficien- 
 cies; he groaned, and moaned, and wheezed, and cursed 
 Morgan through his toilet, as an old buck will, who has 
 been up all night with a rheumatism, and has a long duty 
 to perform. And finally being belted, curled, and set 
 straight, he descended upon the drawing-room, with a 
 grave majestic air, such as befitted one who was at once 
 a man of business and a man of fashion.
 
 PENDENNIS 107 
 
 Pen was not there, however; only Helen, and little 
 Laura sewing at her knees; and to whom he never pre- 
 sented more than a forefinger, as he did on this occasion 
 after saluting his sister-in-law. Laura took the finger 
 trembling and dropped it and then fled out of the 
 room. Major Pendennis did not want to keep her, or 
 indeed to have her in the house at all, and had his private 
 reason for disapproving of her; which we may mention 
 on some future occasion. Meanwhile Laura disap- 
 peared, and wandered about the premises seeking for 
 Pen: whom she presently found in the orchard, pacing 
 up and down a walk there in earnest conversation with 
 Mr. Smirke. He was so occupied that he did not hear 
 Laura's clear voice singing out, until Smirke pulled him 
 by the coat, and pointed towards her as she came run- 
 ning. 
 
 She ran up and put her hand into his. " Come in, 
 Pen," she said, " there's somebody come ; uncle Arthur's 
 come." 
 
 " He is, is he? " said Pen, and she felt him grasp her 
 little hand. He looked round at Smirke with uncommon 
 fierceness, as much as to say, I am ready for him or any 
 man Mr. Smirke cast up his eyes as usual, and heaved 
 a gentle sigh. 
 
 " Lead on, Laura," Pen said, with a half fierce, half 
 comic air " Lead on, and say I wait upon my uncle." 
 But he was laughing in order to hide a great anxiety: 
 and was.screwing his courage inwardly to face the ordeal 
 which he knew was now before him. 
 
 Pen had taken Smirke into his confidence in the last 
 two days, and after the outbreak attendant on the dis- 
 covery of Doctor Portman, and during every one of 
 those forty-eight hours which he had passed in Mr.
 
 108 PENDENNIS 
 
 Smirke's society, had done nothing but talk to his tutor 
 about Miss Fotheringay Miss Emily Fotheringay 
 Emily, &c., to all which talk Smirke listened without 
 difficulty, for he was in love himself, most anxious in 
 all things to propitiate Pen, and indeed very much him- 
 self enraptured by the personal charms of this goddess, 
 whose like, never having been before at a theatrical 
 representation, he had not beheld until now. Pen's fire 
 and volubility, his hot eloquence and rich poetical tropes 
 and figures, his manly heart, kind, ardent, and hopeful, 
 refusing to see any defects in the person he loved, any 
 difficulties in their position that he might not overcome, 
 had half convinced Mr. Smirke that the arrangement 
 proposed by Mr. Pen was a very feasible and prudent 
 one, and that it would be a great comfort to have Emily 
 settled at Fairoaks, Captain Costigan in the yellow 
 room, established for life there, and Pen married at 
 eighteen. 
 
 And it is a fact that in these two days, the boy had 
 almost talked over his mother too; had parried all her 
 objections one after another with that indignant good 
 sense which is often the perfection of absurdity; and 
 had brought her almost to acquiesce in the belief that if 
 the marriage was doomed in heaven, why, doomed it was 
 that if the young woman was a good person, it was 
 all that she for her part had to ask ; and rather to dread 
 the arrival of the guardian uncle who she foresaw would 
 regard Mr. Pen's marriage in a manner very different 
 to that simple, romantic, honest, and utterly absurd way 
 in which the widow was already disposed to look at ques- 
 tions of this sort. Helen Pendennis was a country-bred 
 woman, and the book of life, as she interpreted it, told 
 her a different story to that page which is read in cities.
 
 PENDENNIS 109 
 
 It pleased her (with that dismal pleasure which the idea 
 of sacrificing themselves gives to certain women) to 
 think of the day when she would give up all to Pen, and 
 he should bring his wife home, and she would surrender 
 the keys and the best bed-room, and go and sit at the 
 side of the table, and see him happy. What did she want 
 in life, but to see the lad prosper? As an empress was 
 certainly not too good for him, and would be honoured 
 by becoming Mrs. Pen; so if he selected humble Esther 
 instead of Queen Vashti, she would be content with his 
 lordship's choice. Never mind how lowly or poor the 
 person might be who was to enjoy that prodigious hon- 
 our, Mrs. Pendennis was willing to bow before her and 
 welcome her, and yield her up the first place. But an 
 actress a mature woman, who had long ceased blushing 
 except with rouge, as she stood under the eager glances 
 of thousands of eyes an illiterate and ill-bred person, 
 very likely, who must have lived with light associates, 
 and have heard doubtful conversation Oh! it was hard 
 that such a one should be chosen, and that the matron 
 should be deposed to give place to such a Sultana. 
 
 All these doubts the widow laid before Pen during the 
 two days which had of necessity to elapse ere the uncle 
 came down ; but he met them with that happy frankness 
 and ease which a young gentleman exhibits at his time 
 of life, and routed his mother's objections with infinite 
 satisfaction to himself. Miss Costigan was a paragon 
 of virtue and delicacy ! she was as sensitive as the most 
 timid maiden; she was as pure as the unsullied snow; 
 she had the finest manners, the most graceful wit and 
 genius, the most charming refinement, and justness of 
 appreciation in all matters of taste; she had the most 
 admirable temper and devotion- to her father, a good
 
 110 PENDENNIS 
 
 old gentleman of high family and fallen fortunes, who 
 had lived, however, with the best society in Europe: he 
 was in no hurry, and could afford to wait any time till 
 he was one-and-twenty. But he felt ( and here his face 
 assumed an awful and harrowing solemnity) that he 
 was engaged in the one only passion of his life, and that 
 DEATH alone could close it. 
 
 Helen told him, with a sad smile and a shake of the 
 head, that people survived these passions, and as for 
 long engagements contracted between very young men 
 and old women she knew an instance in her own family 
 -Laura's poor father was an instance how fatal they 
 were. 
 
 Mr. Pen, however, was resolved that death must be 
 his doom in case of disappointment, and rather than this 
 rather than baulk him in fact this lady would have 
 submitted to any sacrifice or personal pain, and would 
 have gone down on her knees and have kissed the feet 
 of a Hottentot daughter-in-law. 
 
 Arthur knew his power over the widow, and the young 
 tyrant was touched whilst he exercised it. In those two 
 days he brought her almost into submission, and patro- 
 nised her very kindly; and he passed one evening with 
 the lovely pie-maker at Chatteris, in which he bragged 
 of his influence over his mother ; and he spent the other 
 night in composing a most flaming and conceited copy 
 of verses to his divinity, in which he vowed, like Mont- 
 rose, that he would make her famous with his sword and 
 glorious by his pen, and that he would love her as no 
 mortal woman had been adored since the creation of 
 womankind. 
 
 It was on that night, long after midnight, that wake- 
 ful Helen, passing stealthily by her son's door, saw a
 
 Poor Pen
 
 PENDENNIS 111 
 
 light streaming through the chink of the door into the 
 dark passage, and heard Pen tossing and tumbling and 
 mumbling verses in his bed. She waited outside for a 
 while, anxiously listening to him. In infantile fevers 
 and early boyish illnesses, many a night before, the kind 
 soul had so kept watch. She turned the lock very softly 
 now, and went in so gently, that Pen for a moment did 
 not see her. His face was turned from her. His papers 
 on his desk were scattered about, and more were lying 
 on the bed round him. He was biting a pencil and think- 
 ing of rhymes and all sorts of follies and passions. He 
 was Hamlet jumping into Ophelia's grave: he was the 
 Stranger taking Mrs. Haller to his arms, beautiful Mrs. 
 Haller, with the raven ringlets falling over her shoul- 
 ders. Despair and Byron, Thomas Moore and all the 
 Loves of the Angels, Waller and Herrick, Beranger and 
 all the love-songs he had ever read, were working and 
 seething in this young gentleman's mind, and he was 
 at the very height and paroxysm of the imaginative 
 phrensy, when his mother found him. 
 
 " Arthur," said the mother's soft silver voice: and he 
 started up and turned round. He clutched some of the 
 papers and pushed them under the pillow. 
 
 ' Why don't you go to sleep, my dear? " she said, with 
 a sweet tender smile, and sate down on the bed and took 
 one of his hot hands. 
 
 Pen looked at her wildly for an instant !< I couldn't 
 sleep," he said " I I was I was writing." And 
 hereupon he flung his arms round her neck and said, 
 " O mother! I love her, I love her! " -How could such 
 a kind soul as that help soothing and pitying him? The 
 gentle creature did her best : and thought with a strange 
 wonderment and tenderness, that it was only yesterday
 
 112 PENDENNIS 
 
 that he was a child in that bed: and how she used to 
 come and say her prayers over it before he woke upon 
 holiday mornings. 
 
 They were very grand verses, no doubt, although 
 Miss Fotheringay did not understand them; but old 
 Cos, with a wink and a knowing finger on his nose, said, 
 " Put them up with th' hother letthers, Milly darling. 
 Poldoody's pomes was nothing to this." So Milly locked 
 up the manuscripts. 
 
 When then, the Major being dressed and presentable, 
 presented himself to Mrs. Pendennis, he found in the 
 course of ten minutes' colloquy that the poor widow was 
 not merely distressed at the idea of the marriage con- 
 templated by Pen, but actually more distressed at think- 
 ing that the boy himself was unhappy about it, and that 
 his uncle and he should have any violent altercation on 
 the subject. She besought Major Pendennis to be very 
 gentle with Arthur: " He has a very high spirit, and 
 will not brook unkind words," she hinted. " Doctor 
 Portman spoke to him rather roughly and I must own 
 unjustly, the other night for my dearest boy's honour 
 is as high as any mother can desire but Pen's answer 
 quite frightened me, it was so indignant. Recollect he 
 is a man now; and be very very cautious," said the 
 widow, laying a fair long hand on the Major's sleeve. 
 
 He took it up, kissed it gallantly, and looked in her 
 alarmed face with wonder, and a scorn which he was too 
 polite to show. " Bon Dieu! " thought the old negotia- 
 tor, " the boy has actually talked the woman round, and 
 she'd get him a wife as she would a toy if Master cried 
 for it. Why are there no such things as lettres-de-cachet 
 and a Bastille for young fellows of family? " The 
 Major lived in such good company that he might be
 
 PENDENNIS 113 
 
 excused for feeling like an Earl. He kissed the widow's 
 timid hand, pressed it in both his, and laid it down on 
 the table with one of his own over it, as he smiled and 
 looked her in the face. 
 
 " Confess," said he, " now, that you are thinking how 
 you possibly can make it up to your conscience to let 
 the boy have his own way." 
 
 She blushed, and was moved in the usual manner of 
 females. " I am thinking that he is very unhappy and 
 I am too " 
 
 1 To contradict him or to let him have his own wish? " 
 asked the other; and added, with great comfort to his 
 inward self, " I'm d d if he shall." 
 
 " To think that he should have formed so foolish and 
 cruel and fatal an attachment," the widow said, " which 
 can but end in pain whatever be the issue." 
 
 " The issue shan't be marriage, my dear sister," the 
 Major said resolutely. ' We're not going to have a 
 Pendennis, the head of the house, marry a strolling 
 mountebank from a booth. No, no, we won't marry 
 into Greenwich Fair, ma'am." 
 
 " If the match is broken suddenly off," the widow 
 interposed, " I don't know what may be the consequence. 
 I know Arthur's ardent temper, the intensity of his af- 
 fections, the agony of his pleasures and disappointments, 
 and I tremble at this one if it must be. Indeed, indeed, 
 it must not come on him too suddenly." 
 
 " My dear madam," the Major said, with an air of 
 the deepest commiseration, " I've no doubt Arthur will 
 have to suffer confoundedly before he gets over the little 
 disappointment. But is he, think you, the only person 
 who has been so rendered miserable? " 
 
 " No, indeed," said Helen, holding down her eyes.
 
 114 PENDENNIS 
 
 She was thinking of her own case, and was at that mo- 
 ment seventeen again, and most miserable. 
 
 " I, myself," whispered her brother-in-law, " have 
 undergone a disappointment in early life. A young 
 woman with fifteen thousand pounds, niece to an Earl 
 most accomplished creature a third of her money 
 would have run up my promotion in no time, and I 
 should have been a lieutenant-colonel at thirty: but it 
 might not be. I was but a penniless lieutenant: her 
 parents interfered: and I embarked for India, where 
 I had the honour of being secretary to Lord Buckley, 
 when Commander-in-Chief without her. What hap- 
 pened? We returned our letters, sent back our locks of 
 hair (the Major here passed his fingers through his 
 wig), we suffered but we recovered. She is now a 
 baronet's wife with thirteen grown-up children ; altered, 
 it is true, in person; but her daughters remind me of 
 what she was, and the third is to be presented early next 
 week." 
 
 Helen did not answer. She was still thinking of old 
 times. I suppose if one lives to be a hundred, there are 
 certain passages of one's early life whereof the recol- 
 lection will always carry us back to youth again, and that 
 Helen was thinking of one of these. 
 
 " Look at my own brother, my dear creature," the 
 Major continued gallantly: "he himself, you know, 
 had a little disappointment when he started in the the 
 medical profession an eligible opportunity presented 
 itself. Miss Balls, I remember the name, was daughter 
 of an apoth a practitioner in very large practice; my 
 brother had very nearly succeeded in his suit. But dif- 
 ficulties arose: disappointments supervened, and and 
 I am sure he had no reason to regret the disappointment
 
 PENDENNIS 115 
 
 which gave him this hand," said the Major, and he once 
 more politely pressed Helen's fingers. 
 
 ' Those marriages between people of such different 
 rank and age," said Helen, " are sad things. I have 
 known them produce a great deal of unhappiness. 
 Laura's father, my cousin, who who was brought up 
 with me " she added, in a low voice, " was an instance 
 of that." 
 
 " Most injudicious," cut in the Major. " I don't 
 know anything more painful than for a man to marry 
 his superior in age or his inferior in station. Fancy 
 marrying a woman of a low rank of life, and having 
 your house filled with her confounded tag-rag-and-bob- 
 tail relations! Fancy your wife attached to a mother 
 who dropped her h's, or called Maria Marire ! How are 
 you to introduce her into society? My dear Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis, I will name no names, but in the very best circles 
 of London society I have seen men suffering the most 
 excruciating agony, I have known them to be cut, to be 
 lost utterly, from the vulgarity of their wives' connec- 
 tions. What did Lady Snapperton do last year at her 
 dejeuner dansant after the Bohemian Ball? She told 
 Lord Brouncker that he might bring his daughters or 
 send them with a proper chaperon, but that she would 
 not receive Lady Brouncker: who was a druggist's 
 daughter, or some such thing, and as Tom Wagg re- 
 marked of her, never wanted medicine certainly, for she 
 never had an h in her life. Good Ged, what would have 
 been the trifling pang of a separation in the first in- 
 stance to the enduring infliction of a constant misalli- 
 ance and intercourse with low people? " 
 
 " What, indeed! " said Helen, dimly disposed towards 
 laughter, but yet checking the inclination, because she
 
 116 PENDENNIS 
 
 remembered in what prodigious respect her deceased 
 husband held Major Pendennis and his stories of the 
 great world. 
 
 * Then this fatal woman is ten years older than that 
 silly young scapegrace of an Arthur. What happens 
 in such cases, my dear creature? I don't mind telling 
 you now we are alone: that in the highest state of soci- 
 ety, misery, undeviating misery, is the result. Look at 
 Lord Clodworthy come into a room with his wife why, 
 good Ged, she looks like Clodworthy's mother. What's 
 the case between Lord and Lady Willowbank, whose 
 love match was notorious? He has already cut her down 
 twice when she has hanged herself out of jealousy for 
 Mademoiselle de Sainte Cunegonde, the dancer; and 
 mark my words, good Ged, one day he'll not cut the old 
 woman down. No, my dear madam, you are not in the 
 world, but I am: you are a little romantic and senti- 
 mental (you know you are women with those large 
 beautiful eyes always are) ; you must leave this matter 
 to my experience. Marry this woman! Marry at eigh- 
 teen an actress of thirty bah bah! I would as soon he 
 sent into the kitchen and married the cook." 
 
 " I know the evils of premature engagements," sighed 
 out Helen: and as she has made this allusion no less 
 than thrice in the course of the above conversation, and 
 seems to be so oppressed with the notion of long engage- 
 ments and unequal marriages, and as the circumstance 
 we have to relate will explain what perhaps some per- 
 sons are anxious to know, namely, who little Laura is, 
 who has appeared more than once before us, it will be 
 as well to clear up these points in another chapter.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 IN WHICH PEN IS KEPT WAITING AT THE DOOR, WHILE 
 THE READER IS INFORMED WHO LITTLE LAURA WAS 
 
 NCE upon a time, then, 
 there was a young gen- 
 tleman of Cambridge 
 University who 
 came to pass the 
 long vacation at 
 the village where 
 young Helen 
 Thistlewood was 
 living with her 
 mother, the widow 
 of the lieutenant 
 slain at Copenha- 
 gen. This gentle- 
 man, whose name 
 was the Reverend 
 Francis Bell, was 
 nephew to Mrs. Thistlewood, and by consequence, own 
 cousin to Miss Helen, so that it was very right that he 
 should take lodgings in his aunt's house, who lived in a 
 very small way; and there he passed the long vacation, 
 reading with three or four pupils who accompanied him 
 to the village. Mr. Bell was fellow of a college, and 
 famous in the University for his learning and skill as a 
 tutor. 
 
 His two kinswomen understood pretty early that the 
 
 117
 
 118 PENDENNIS 
 
 reverend gentleman was engaged to be married, and was 
 only waiting for a college living to enable him to fulfil 
 his engagement. His intended bride was the daughter 
 of another parson, who had acted as Mr. Bell's own pri- 
 vate tutor in Bell's early life, and it was whilst under 
 Mr. Coacher's roof, indeed, and when only a boy of sev- 
 enteen or eighteen years of age, that the impetuous 
 young Bell had flung himself at the feet of Miss Martha 
 Coacher, whom he was helping to pick peas in the gar- 
 den. On his knees, before those peas and her, he pledged 
 himself to an endless affection. 
 
 Miss Coacher was by many years the young fellow's 
 senior: and her own heart had been lacerated by many 
 previous disappointments in the matrimonial line. No 
 less than three pupils of her father had trifled with those 
 young affections. The apothecary of the village had 
 despicably jilted her. The dragoon officer, with whom 
 she had danced so many many times during that happy 
 season which she passed at Bath with her gouty grand- 
 mamma, one day gaily shook his bridle-rein and galloped 
 away, never to return. Wounded by the shafts of re- 
 peated ingratitude, can it be wondered at that the heart 
 of Martha Coacher should pant to find rest somewhere? 
 She listened to the proposals of the gawky gallant honest 
 boy, with great kindness and good-humour ; at the end of 
 his speech she said, " Law, Bell, I'm sure you are too 
 young to think of such things ; " but intimated that she 
 too would revolve them in her own virgin bosom. She 
 could not refer Mr. Bell to her mamma, for Mr. 
 Coacher was a widower, and being immersed in his 
 books, was of course unable to take the direction of so 
 frail and wondrous an article as a lady's heart, which 
 Miss Martha had to manage for herself.
 
 PENDENNIS 119 
 
 A lock of her hair tied up in a piece of blue ribbon, 
 conveyed to the happy Bell the result of the Vestal's 
 conference with herself. Thrice before had she snipt off 
 one of her auburn ringlets, and given them away. The 
 possessors were faithless, but the hair had grown again: 
 and Martha had indeed occasion to say that men were de- 
 ceivers, when she handed over this token of love to the 
 simple boy. 
 
 Number 6, however, was an exception to former pas- 
 sions Francis Bell was the most faithful of lovers. 
 When his time arrived to go to college, and it became 
 necessary to acquaint Mr. Coacher of the arrangements 
 that had been made, the latter cried, " God bless my soul, 
 I hadn't the least idea what was going on ; " as was in- 
 deed very likely, for he had been taken in three times 
 before in precisely a similar manner; and Francis went 
 to the University resolved to conquer honours, so as to 
 be able to lay them at the feet of his beloved Martha. 
 
 This prize in view made him labour prodigiously. 
 News came, term after term, of the honours he won. He 
 sent the prize-books for his college essays to old Coacher, 
 and his silver declamation cup to Miss Martha. In due 
 season he was high among the Wranglers, and a Fellow 
 of his College ; and during all the time of these transac- 
 tions a constant tender correspondence was kept up with 
 Miss Coacher, to whose influence, and perhaps with jus- 
 tice, he attributed the successes which he had won. 
 
 By the time, however, when the Rev. Francis Bell, 
 M.A., and Fellow and Tutor of his College, was twenty- 
 six years of age, it happened that Miss Coacher was 
 thirty-four, nor had her charms, her manners, or her 
 temper improved since that sunny day in the spring- 
 time of life when he found her picking peas in the
 
 120 PENDENNIS 
 
 garden. Having achieved his honours, he relaxed in the 
 ardour of his studies, and his judgment and tastes also 
 perhaps became cooler. The sunshine of the pea- 
 garden faded away from Miss Martha, and poor Bell 
 found himself engaged and his hand pledged to that 
 bond in a thousand letters to a coarse, ill-tempered, ill- 
 favoured, ill-mannered, middle-aged woman. 
 
 It was in consequence of one of many altercations ( in 
 which Martha's eloquence shone, and in which therefore 
 she was frequently pleased to indulge ) , that Francis re- 
 fused to take his pupils to Bearleader's Green, where 
 Mr. Coacher's living was, and where Bell was in the 
 habit of spending the summer: and he bethought him 
 that he would pass the vacation at his aunt's village, 
 which he had not seen for many years not since little 
 Helen was a girl, and used to sit on his knee. Down 
 then he came and lived with them. Helen was grown a 
 beautiful young woman now. The cousins were nearly 
 four months together, from June to October. They 
 walked in the summer evenings: they met in the early 
 morn. They read out of the same book when the old 
 lady dozed at night over the candles. What little Helen 
 knew, Frank taught her. She sang to him : she gave her 
 artless heart to him. She was aware of all his story. 
 Had he made any secret? had he not shown the picture 
 of the woman to whom he was engaged, and with a 
 blush, her letters, hard, eager, and cruel? The days 
 went on and on, happier and closer, with more kindness, 
 more confidence, and more pity. At last one morning 
 in October came when Francis went back to college, and 
 the poor girl felt that her tender heart was gone with 
 him. 
 
 Frank too wakened up from the delightful midsum-
 
 PENDENNIS 121 
 
 mer-dream to the horrible reality of his own pain. He 
 gnashed and tore at the chain which bound him. He was 
 frantic to break it and be free. Should he confess? 
 give his savings to the woman to whom he was bound, 
 and beg his release? there was time yet he tempo- 
 rised. No living might fall in for years to come. The 
 cousins went on corresponding sadly and fondly: the 
 betrothed woman, hard, jealous, and dissatisfied, com- 
 plaining bitterly, and with reason, of her Francis's 
 altered tone. 
 
 At last things came to a crisis, and the new attach- 
 ment was discovered. Francis owned it, cared not to 
 disguise it, rebuked Martha with her violent temper and 
 angry imperiousness, and, worst of all, with her infe- 
 riority and her age. 
 
 Her reply was, that if he did not keep his promise she 
 would carry his letters into every court in the kingdom- 
 letters in which his love was pledged to her ten thousand 
 times; and, after exposing him to the world as the per- 
 jurer and traitor he was, she would kill herself. 
 
 Frank had one more interview with Helen, whose 
 mother was dead then, and who was living companion 
 with old Lady Pontypool, one more interview, where 
 it was resolved that he was to do his duty ; that is, to re- 
 deem his vow; that is, to pay a debt cozened from him 
 by a sharper; that is, to make two honest people miser- 
 able. So the two judged their duty to be, and they 
 parted. 
 
 The living fell in only too soon; but yet Frank Bell 
 was quite a grey and worn-out man when he was in- 
 ducted into it. Helen wrote him a letter on his mar- 
 riage, beginning, " My dear Cousin," and ending " al- 
 ways truly yours." She sent him back the other letters,
 
 122 PENDENNIS 
 
 and the lock of his hair all but a small piece. She had 
 it in her desk when she was talking to the Major. 
 
 Bell lived for three or four years in his living, at the 
 end of which time, the Chaplainship of Coventry Island 
 falling vacant, Frank applied for it privately, and hav- 
 ing procured it, announced the appointment to his 
 wife. She objected, as she did to everything. He told 
 her bitterly that he did not want her to come: so she 
 went. Bell went out in Governor Crawley's time, and 
 was very intimate with that gentleman in his later 
 years. And it was in Coventry Island, years after 
 his own marriage, and five years after he had heard of 
 the birth of Helen's boy, that his own daughter was 
 born. 
 
 She was not the daughter of the first Mrs. Bell, who 
 died of island fever very soon after Helen Pendennis 
 and her husband, to whom Helen had told everything, 
 wrote to inform Bell of the birth of their child. " I was 
 old, was I? " said Mrs. Bell the first; " I was old, and 
 her inferior, was I? but I married you, Mr. Bell, and 
 kept you from marrying her!" and hereupon she died. 
 Bell married a colonial lady, whom he loved fondly. 
 But he was not doomed tc prosper in love ; and, this lady 
 dying in child-birth, Bell gave up too : sending his little 
 girl home to Helen Pendennis and her husband, with a 
 parting prayer that they would befriend her. 
 
 The little thing came to Fairoaks from Bristol, which 
 is not very far off, dressed in black, and in company of 
 a soldier's wife, her nurse, at parting from whom she 
 wept bitterly. But she soon dried up her grief under 
 Helen's motherly care. 
 
 Round her neck she had a locket with hair, which 
 Helen had given, ah how many years ago ! to poor Fran-
 
 PENDENNIS 123 
 
 cis, dead and buried. This child was all that was left of 
 him, and she cherished, as so tender a creature would, the 
 legacy which he had bequeathed to her. The girl's name, 
 as his dying letter stated, was Helen Laura. But John 
 Pendennis, though he accepted the trust, was always 
 rather jealous of the orphan; and gloomily ordered that 
 she should be called by her own mother's name ; and not 
 by that first one which her father had given her. She 
 was afraid of Mr. Pendennis, to the last moment of his 
 life. And it was only when her husband was gone that 
 Helen dared openly to indulge in the tenderness which 
 she felt for the little girl. 
 
 Thus it was that Laura Bell became Mrs. Pendennis's 
 daughter. Neither her husband nor that gentleman's 
 brother, the Major, viewed her with very favourable 
 eyes. She reminded the first of circumstances in his 
 wife's life which he was forced to accept, but would have 
 forgotten much more willingly: and as for the second, 
 how could he regard her? She was neither related to his 
 own family of Pendennis, nor to any nobleman in this 
 empire, and she had but a couple of thousand pounds for 
 her fortune. 
 
 And now let Mr. Pen come in, who has been waiting 
 all this while. 
 
 Having strung up his nerves, and prepared himself, 
 without at the door, for the meeting, he came to it, de- 
 termined to face the awful uncle. He had settled in his 
 mind that the encounter was to be a fierce one, and was 
 resolved on bearing it through with all the courage and 
 dignity of the famous family which he represented. 
 And he flung open the door and entered with the most 
 severe and warlike expression, armed cap-a-pie as it 
 were, with lance couched and plumes displayed, and
 
 124 PENDENNIS 
 
 glancing at his adversary, as if to say, " Come on, I'm 
 ready." 
 
 The old man of the world, as he surveyed the boy's 
 demeanour, could hardly help a grin at his admirable 
 pompous simplicity. Major Pendennis too had exam- 
 ined his ground ; and finding that the widow was already 
 half won over to the enemy, and having a shrewd notion 
 that threats and tragic exhortations would have no effect 
 upon the boy, who was inclined to be perfectly stubborn 
 and awfully serious, the Major laid aside the authorita- 
 tive manner at once, and with the most good-humoured 
 natural smile in the world, held out his hands to Pen, 
 shook the lad's passive fingers gaily, and said, " Well, 
 Pen, my boy, tell us all about it." 
 
 Helen was delighted with the generosity of the Ma- 
 jor's good humour. On the contrary, it quite took aback 
 and disappointed poor Pen, whose nerves were strung 
 up for a tragedy, and who felt that his grand entree was 
 altogether baulked and ludicrous. He blushed and 
 winced with mortified vanity and bewilderment. He 
 felt immensely inclined to begin to cry. " I I I 
 didn't know that you were come till just now," he said: 
 " is is town very full, I suppose? " 
 
 If Pen could hardly gulp his tears down, it was all 
 the Major could do to keep from laughter. He turned 
 round and shot a comical glance at Mrs. Pendennis, who 
 too felt that the scene was at once ridiculous and senti- 
 mental. And so, having nothing to say, she went up and 
 kissed Mr. Pen : as he thought of her tenderness and soft 
 obedience to his wishes, it is very possible too the boy was 
 melted. 
 
 ' What a couple of fools they are," thought the old 
 guardian. " If I hadn't come down, she would have
 
 PENDENNIS 125 
 
 driven over in state to pay a visit and give her blessing to 
 the young lady's family." 
 
 " Come, come," said he, still grinning at the couple, 
 " let us have as little sentiment as possible, and Pen, my 
 good fellow, tell us the whole story." 
 
 Pen got back at once to his tragic and heroical air. 
 ' The story is, sir," said he, " as I have written it to you 
 before. I have made the acquaintance of a most beau- 
 tiful and most virtuous lady ; of a high family, although 
 in reduced circumstances; I have found the woman in 
 whom I know that the happiness of my life is centred; 
 I feel that I never, never can think about any woman 
 but her. I am aware of the difference of our ages and 
 other difficulties in my way. But my affection was so 
 great that I felt I could surmount all these; that we 
 both could: and she has consented to unite her lot with 
 mine, and to accept my heart and my fortune." 
 
 " How much is that, my boy? " said the Major. 
 " Has anybody left you some money? I don't know 
 that you are worth a shilling in the world." 
 
 ' You know what I have is his," cried out Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis. 
 
 "Good heavens, madam, hold your tongue!" was 
 what the guardian was disposed to say; but he kept his 
 temper, not without a struggle. " No doubt, no doubt," 
 he said. ' You would sacrifice anything for him. 
 Everybody knows that. But it is, after all, then, your 
 fortune which Pen is offering to the young lady ; and of 
 which he wishes to take possession at eighteen." 
 
 " I know my mother will give me anything," Pen said, 
 looking rather disturbed. 
 
 "Yes, my good fellow, but there is reason in all 
 things. If your mother keeps the house, it is but fair
 
 126 PENDENNIS 
 
 that she should select her company. When you give her 
 house over her head, and transfer her banker's account 
 to yourself for the benefit of Miss What-d'-you-call-'em 
 Miss Costigan don't you think you should at least 
 have consulted my sister as one of the principal parties 
 in the transaction? I am speaking to you, you see, with- 
 out the least anger or assumption of authority, such as 
 the law and your father's will give me over you for three 
 years to come but as one man of the world to another, 
 and I ask you, if you think that, because you can do 
 what you like with your mother, therefore you have a 
 right to do so? As you are her dependant, would it not 
 have been more generous to wait before you took this 
 step, and at least to have paid her the courtesy to ask her 
 leave? " 
 
 Pen held down his head, and began dimly to per- 
 ceive that the action on which he had prided himself as 
 a most romantic, generous instance of disinterested 
 affection, was perhaps a very selfish and headstrong piece 
 of folly. 
 
 " I did it in a moment of passion," said Pen, flounder- 
 ing ; " I was not aware what I was going to say or to do " 
 (and in this he spoke with perfect sincerity). "But 
 now it is said, and I stand to it. No; I neither can nor 
 will recall it. I'll die rather than do so. And I I don't 
 want to burden my mother," he continued. " I'll work 
 for myself. I'll go on the stage, and act with her. 
 She she says I should do well there." 
 
 " But will she take you on those terms? " the Major 
 interposed. " Mind, I do not say that Miss Costigan is 
 not the most disinterested of women : but, don't you sup- 
 pose now, fairly, that your position as a young gentle- 
 man of ancient birth and decent expectations, forms a
 
 PENDENNIS 127 
 
 part of the cause why she finds your addresses wel- 
 come? " 
 
 "I'll die, I say, rather than forfeit my pledge to her," 
 said Pen, doubling his fists and turning red. 
 
 ' Who asks you, my dear friend? " answered the im- 
 perturbable guardian. " No gentleman breaks his word, 
 of course, when it has been given freely. But after all, 
 you can wait. You owe something to your mother, 
 something to your family something to me as your 
 father's representative." 
 
 " Oh, of course," Pen said, feeling rather relieved. 
 
 " Well, as you have pledged your word to her, give us 
 another, will you, Arthur? " 
 
 " What is it? " Arthur asked. 
 
 " That you will make no private marriage that ) r ou 
 won't be taking a trip to Scotland, you understand." 
 
 " That would be a falsehood. Pen never told his 
 mother a falsehood," Helen said. 
 
 Pen hung down his head again, and his eyes filled with 
 tears of shame. Had not this whole intrigue been a 
 falsehood to that tender and confiding creature who was 
 ready to give up all for his sake ? He gave his uncle his 
 hand. 
 
 " No, sir on my word of honour, as a gentleman," 
 he said, " I will never marry without my mother's con- 
 sent! " and giving Helen a bright parting look of confi- 
 dence and affection unchangeable, the boy went out of 
 the drawing-room into his own study. 
 
 " He's an angel he's an angel," the mother cried out 
 in one of her usual raptures. 
 
 " He comes of a good stock, ma'am," said her brother- 
 in-law " of a good stock on both sides." The Major 
 was greatly pleased with the result of his diplomacy
 
 128 PEXDENNIS 
 
 so much so, that he once more saluted the tips of Mrs. 
 Pendennis's glove, and dropping the curt, manly, and 
 straightforward tone in which he had conducted the con- 
 versation with the lad, assumed a certain drawl, which he 
 always adopted when he was most conceited and fine. 
 
 " My dear creature," said he, in that his politest tone, 
 " I think it certainly as well that I came down, and I 
 flatter myself that last botte was a successful one. I tell 
 you how I came to think of it. Three years ago my kind 
 friend Lady Ferrybridge sent for me in the greatest 
 state of alarm about her son Gretna, whose affair you 
 remember, and implored me to use my influence with 
 the young gentleman, who was engaged in an affaire de 
 cceur with a Scotch clergyman's daughter, Miss Mac 
 Toddy. I implored, I entreated gentle measures. But 
 Lord Ferrybridge was furious, and tried the high hand. 
 Gretna was sulky and silent, and his parents thought 
 they had conquered. But what was the fact, my dear 
 creature ? The young people had been married for three 
 months before Lord Ferrybridge knew anything about 
 it. And that was why I extracted the promise from 
 Master Pen." 
 
 " Arthur would never have done so," Mrs. Pendennis 
 said. 
 
 " He hasn't, that is one comfort," answered the 
 brother-in-law. 
 
 Like a wary and patient man of the world, Major 
 Pendennis did not press poor Pen any farther for the 
 moment, but hoped the best from time, and that the 
 young fellow's eyes would be opened before long to 
 see the absurdity of which he was guilty. And having 
 found out how keen the boy's point of honour was, he 
 worked kindly upon that kindly feeling with great skill,
 
 PENDENNIS 129 
 
 discoursing him over their wine after dinner, and point- 
 ing out to Pen the necessity of a perfect uprightness and 
 openness in all his dealings, and entreating that his com- 
 munications with his interesting young friend (as the 
 Major politely called Miss Fotheringay) should be car- 
 ried on with the knowledge, if not approbation, of Mrs. 
 Pendennis. " After all, Pen," the Major said, with a 
 convenient frankness that did not displease the boy, 
 whilst it advanced the interests of the negotiator, " you 
 must bear in mind that you are throwing yourself away. 
 Your mother may submit to your marriage as she would 
 to anything else you desired, if you did but cry long 
 enough for it : but be sure of this, that it can never please 
 her. You take a young woman off the boards of a coun- 
 try theatre and prefer her, for such is the case, to one 
 of the finest ladies in England. And your mother will 
 submit to your choice, but you can't suppose that she will 
 be happy under it. I have often fancied, entre nous, 
 that my sister had it in her eye to make a marriage be- 
 tween you and that little ward of hers Flora, Laura 
 what's her name? And I always determined to do my 
 small endeavour to prevent any such match. The child 
 has but two thousand pounds, I am given to understand. 
 It is only with the utmost economy and care that my 
 sister can provide for the decent maintenance of her 
 house, and for your appearance and education as a gen- 
 tleman ; and I don't care to own to you that I had other 
 and much higher views for you. With your name and 
 birth, sir with your talents, which I suppose are re- 
 spectable, with the friends whom I have the honour to 
 possess, I could have placed you 'in an excellent posi- 
 tion a remarkable position for a young man of such 
 exceeding small means, and had hoped to see you, at
 
 130 PENDENNIS 
 
 least, try to restore the honours of our name. Your mo- 
 ther's softness stopped one prospect, or you might have 
 been a general, like our gallant ancestor who fought at 
 Ramillies and Malplaquet. I had another plan in view : 
 my excellent and kind friend, Lord Bagwig, who is very 
 well disposed towards me, would, I have little doubt, 
 have attached you to his mission at Pumpernickel, and 
 you might have advanced in the diplomatic service. But, 
 pardon me for recurring to the subject; how is a man 
 to serve a young gentleman of eighteen, who proposes 
 to marry a lady of thirty, whom he has selected from a 
 booth in a fair? well, not a fair, barn. That profes- 
 sion at once is closed to you. The public service is closed 
 to you. Society is closed to you. You see, my good 
 friend, to what you bring yourself. You may get on at 
 the bar, to be sure, where I am given to understand that 
 gentlemen of merit occasionally marry out of their 
 kitchens ; but in no other profession. Or you may come 
 and live down here down here, mon Dieu! for ever " 
 (said the Major, with a dreary shrug, as he thought with 
 inexpressible fondness of Pall Mall), " where your mo- 
 ther will receive the Mrs. Arthur that is to be, with per- 
 fect kindness ; where the good people of the county won't 
 visit you ; and where, by Gad, sir, I shall be shy of visit- 
 ing you myself, for I'm a plain spoken man, and I own 
 to you that I like to live with gentlemen for my com- 
 panions; where you will have to live, with rum-and- 
 water-drinking gentlemen-farmers, and drag through 
 your life the young husband of an old woman, who, if she 
 doesn't quarrel with your mother, will at least cost that 
 lady her position in society, and drag her down into that 
 dubious caste into which you must inevitably fall. It 
 is no affair of mine, my good sir. I am not angry.
 
 PENDENNIS 131 
 
 Your downfall will not hurt me farther than that it will 
 extinguish the hopes I had of seeing my family once 
 more taking its place in the world. It is only your mo- 
 ther and yourself that will be ruined. And I pity you 
 both from my soul. Pass the claret : it is some I sent to 
 your poor father; I remember I bought it at poor Lord 
 Levant's sale. But of course," added the Major, smack- 
 ing the wine, " having engaged yourself, you will do 
 what becomes you as a man of honour, however fatal 
 your promise may be. However, promise us on our side, 
 my boy, what I set out by entreating you to grant, 
 that there shall -be nothing clandestine, that you will pur- 
 sue your studies, that you will only visit your interesting 
 friend at proper intervals. Do you write to her much? " 
 
 Pen blushed and said, " Why, yes, he had written." 
 
 " I suppose verses, eh! as well as prose? I was a dab 
 at verses myself. I recollect when I first joined, I used 
 to write verses for the fellows in the regiment ; and did 
 some pretty things in that way. I was talking to my old 
 friend General Hobbler about some lines I dashed off 
 for him in the year 1806, when we were at the Cape, and, 
 Gad, he remembered every line of them still; for he'd 
 used 'em so often, the old rogue, and had actually tried 
 'em on Mrs. Hobbler, sir who brought him sixty thou- 
 sand pounds. I suppose you've tried verses, eh, Pen? " 
 
 Pen blushed again, and said, " Why, yes, he had writ- 
 ten verses." 
 
 " And does the fair one respond in poetry or prose ? " 
 asked the Major, eyeing his nephew with the queerest 
 expression, as much as to say, " O Moses and Green 
 Spectacles! what a fool the boy is." 
 
 Pen blushed again. She had written, but not in verse, 
 the young lover owned, and he. gave his breast-pocket
 
 132 PENDENNIS 
 
 the benefit of a squeeze with his left arm, which the Ma- 
 jor remarked, according to his wont. 
 
 " You have got the letters there, I see," said the old 
 campaigner, nodding at Pen and pointing to his own 
 chest (which was manfully wadded with cotton by Mr. 
 Stultz ) . ' You know you have. I would give twopence 
 to see 'em." 
 
 " Why," said Pen, twiddling the stalks of the straw- 
 berries, " I I," but this sentence was never finished; for 
 Pen's face was so comical and embarrassed, as the Major 
 watched it, that the elder could contain his gravity no 
 longer, and burst into a fit of laughter, in which chorus 
 Pen himself was obliged to join after a minute: when 
 he broke out fairly into a guffaw. 
 
 It sent them with great good humour into Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis's drawing-room. She was pleased to hear them 
 laughing in the hall as they crossed it. 
 
 'You sly rascal!" said the Major, putting his arm 
 gaily on Pen's shoulder, and giving a playful push at 
 the boy's breast-pocket. He felt the papers crackling 
 there sure enough. The young fellow was delighted 
 conceited triumphant and in one word, a spooney. 
 
 The pair came to the tea-table in the highest spirits. 
 The Major's politeness was beyond expression. He had 
 never tasted such good tea, and such bread was only to 
 be had in the country. He asked Mrs. Pendennis for 
 one of her charming songs. He then made Pen sing, 
 and was delighted and astonished at the beauty of the 
 boy's voice: he made his nephew fetch his maps and 
 drawings, and praised them as really remarkable works 
 of talent in a young fellow: he complimented him on 
 his French pronunciation : he flattered the simple boy as 
 adroitly as ever lover flattered a mistress : and when bed-
 
 PENDENNIS 133 
 
 time came, mother and son went to their several rooms 
 perfectly enchanted with the kind Major. 
 
 When they had reached those apartments, I suppose 
 Helen took to her knees as usual : and Pen read over his 
 letters before going to bed: just as if he didn't know 
 every word of them by heart already. In truth there 
 were but three of those documents: and to learn their 
 contents required no great effort of memory. 
 
 In No. 1, Miss Fotheringay presents grateful com- 
 pliments to Mr. Pendennis, and in her papa's name and 
 her own begs to thank him for his most beautiful pres- 
 ents. They will always be kept carefully; and Miss F. 
 and Captain C. will never forget the delightful evening 
 which they passed on Tuesday last. 
 
 No. 2, said Dear Sir, we shall have a small quiet 
 party of social friends at our humble board, next Tues- 
 day evening, at an early tea, when I shall wear the beau- 
 tiful scarf which, with its accompanying delightful 
 verses, I shall ever, ever cherish: and papa bids me say 
 how happy he will be if you will join f( the feast of rea- 
 son and the flow of soul " in our festive little party, as 
 I am sure will be your truly grateful 
 
 EMILY FOTHERINGAY. 
 
 No. 3 was somewhat more confidential, and showed 
 that matters had proceeded rather far. You were odious 
 yesterday night, the letter said. Why did you not come 
 to the stage-door? Papa could not escort me on account 
 of his eye ; he had an accident, and fell down over a loose 
 carpet on the stair on Sunday night. I saw you looking 
 at Miss Diggle all night; and you were so enchanted 
 with Lydia Languish you scarcely once looked at Julia.
 
 154 PENDENNIS 
 
 I could have crushed Bingley, I was so angry. I play 
 Ella Rosenberg on Friday: will you come then? Miss 
 Diggle performs ever your 
 
 E. F. 
 
 These three letters Mr. Pen used to read at intervals, 
 during the day and night, and embrace with that delight 
 and fervour which such beautiful compositions surely 
 warranted. A thousand times at least he had kissed 
 fondly the musky satin paper, made sacred to him by 
 the hand of Emily Fotheringay. This was all he had 
 in return for his passion and flames, his vows and pro- 
 tests, his rhymes and similes, his wakeful nights and end- 
 less thoughts, his fondness, fears and folly. The young 
 wiseacre had pledged away his all for this: signed his 
 name to endless promissory notes, conferring his heart 
 upon the bearer: bound himself for life, and got back 
 twopence as an equivalent. For Miss Costigan was a 
 young lady of such perfect good conduct and self-com- 
 mand, that she never would have thought of giving 
 more, and reserved the treasures of her affection until 
 she could transfer them lawfully at church. 
 
 Howbeit, Mr. Pen was content with what tokens of 
 regard he had got, and mumbled over his three letters 
 in a rapture of high spirits, and went to sleep delighted 
 with his kind old uncle from London, who must evi- 
 dently yield to his wishes in time; and, in a word, in a 
 preposterous state of contentment with himself and all 
 the world.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 IN WHICH THE MAJOR OPENS THE CAMPAIGN 
 
 ET those who have the 
 blessed privilege 
 of an entree into 
 the most select cir- 
 cles, admit that 
 Major Pendennis 
 was a man of no 
 ordinary generos- 
 ity and affection, 
 in the sacrifice 
 which he now 
 made. He gave 
 up London in 
 May, his newspapers and his mornings his after- 
 noons from club to club, his little confidential visits to 
 my Ladies, his rides in Rotten Row, his dinners, and his 
 stall at the Opera, his rapid escapades to Fulham or 
 Richmond on Saturdays and Sundays, his bow from my 
 Lord Duke or my Lord Marquis at the great London 
 entertainments, and his name in the " Morning Post " 
 of the succeeding day, his quieter little festivals, more 
 select, secret, and delightful all these he resigned to 
 lock himself into a lone little country house, with a sim- 
 ple widow and a greenhorn of a son, a mawkish curate, 
 and a little girl of twelve years of age. 
 
 He made the sacrifice, and it was the greater that 
 
 135
 
 136 PENDENNIS 
 
 few knew the extent of it. His letters came down 
 franked from town, and he showed the invitations to 
 Helen with a sigh. It was beautiful and tragical to see 
 him refuse one party after another at least to those 
 who could understand, as Helen didn't, the melancholy 
 grandeur of his self-denial. Helen did not, or only 
 smiled at the awful pathos with which the Major spoke 
 of the Court Guide in general: but young Pen looked 
 with great respect at the great names upon the super- 
 scriptions of his uncle's letters, and listened to the Ma- 
 jor's stories about the fashionable world with constant 
 interest and sympathy. 
 
 The elder Pendennis's rich memory was stored with 
 thousands of these delightful tales, and he poured them 
 into Pen's willing ear. He knew the name and pedigree 
 of everybody in the Peerage, and everybody's relations. 
 " My dear boy," he would say, with a mournful earnest- 
 ness and veracity, " you cannot begin your genealogical 
 studies too early; I wish to Heavens you would read in 
 Debrett every day. Not so much the historical part (for 
 the pedigrees, between ourselves, are many of them very 
 fabulous, and there are few families that can show such 
 a clear descent as our own) as the account of family alli- 
 ances, and who is related to whom. I have known a 
 man's career in life blasted, by ignorance on this all- 
 important subject. Why, only last month, at dinner at 
 my Lord Hobanob's, a young man, who has lately been 
 received amongst us, young Mr. Suckling (author of a 
 work, I believe), began to speak lightly of Admiral 
 Bowser's conduct for ratting to Ministers, in what I 
 must own is the most audacious manner. But who do 
 you think sate next and opposite to this Mr. Suckling? 
 Why why, next to him was Lady Grampound Bow-
 
 PENDENNIS 137 
 
 ser's daughter, and opposite to him was Lord Gram- 
 pound Bowser's son-in-law. The infatuated young man 
 went on cutting his jokes at the Admiral's expense, fan- 
 cying that all the world was laughing with him, and I 
 leave you to imagine Lady Hobanob's feelings Hoba- 
 nob's! those of every well-bred man, as the wretched 
 intrus was so exposing himself. He will never dine 
 again in South Street. I promise you that." 
 
 With such discourses the Major entertained his 
 nephew, as he paced the terrace in front of the house 
 for his two hours' constitutional walk, or as they sate 
 together after dinner over their wine. He grieved that 
 Sir Francis Clavering had not come down to the Park, 
 to live in it since his marriage, and to make a society for 
 the neighbourhood. He mourned that Lord Eyrie was 
 not in the country, that he might take Pen and present 
 him to his lordship. " He has daughters," the Major 
 said. 'Who knows? you might have married Lady 
 Emily or Lady Barbara Trehawk; but all those dreams 
 are over ; my poor fellow, you must lie on the bed which 
 you have made for yourself." 
 
 These things to hear did young Pendennis seriously 
 incline. They are not so interesting in print as when 
 delivered orally; but the Major's anecdotes of the great 
 George, of the Royal Dukes, of the statesmen, beauties, 
 and fashionable ladies of the day, filled young Pen's soul 
 with longing and wonder; and he found the conversa- 
 tions with his guardian, which sadly bored and perplexed 
 poor Mrs. Pendennis, for his own part never tedious. 
 
 It can't be said that Mr. Pen's new guide, philosopher 
 and friend, discoursed him on the most elevated subjects, 
 or treated the subjects which he chose in the most ele- 
 vated manner. But his morality, such as it was, was
 
 138 PENDENNIS 
 
 consistent. It might not, perhaps, tend to a man's prog- 
 ress in another world, but it was pretty well calculated 
 to advance his interests in this; and then it must be re- 
 membered, that the Major never for one instant doubted 
 that his views were the only views practicable, and that 
 his conduct was perfectly virtuous and respectable. He 
 was a man of honour, in a word : and had his eyes, what 
 he called, open. He took pity on this young greenhorn 
 of a nephew, and wanted to open his eyes too. 
 
 No man, for instance, went more regularly to church 
 when in the country than the old bachelor. " It don't 
 matter so much in town, Pen," he said, " for there the 
 women go and the men are not missed. But when a gen- 
 tleman is sur ses terres, he must give an example to the 
 country people : and if I could turn a tune, I even think 
 I should sing. The Duke of St. David's, whom I have 
 the honour of knowing, always, sings in the country, and 
 let me tell you, it has a doosed fine effect from the family 
 pew. And you are somebody down here. As long as 
 the Claverings are away you are the first man in the par- 
 ish: or as good as any. You might represent the town 
 if you played your cards well. Your poor dear father 
 would have done so had he lived ; so might you. Not if 
 you marry a lady, however amiable, whom the country 
 people won't meet. Well, well: it's a painful subject. 
 Let us change it, my boy." But if Major Pendennis 
 changed the subject once he recurred to it a score of 
 times in the day: and the moral of his discourse always 
 was, that Pen was throwing himself away. Now it does 
 not require much coaxing or wheedling to make a simple 
 boy believe that he is a very fine fellow. 
 
 Pen was glad enough, we have said, to listen to his 
 elder's talk. The conversation of Captain Costigan be-
 
 PENDENNIS 139 
 
 came by no means pleasant to him, and the idea of that 
 tipsy old father-in-law haunted him with terror. He 
 couldn't bring that man, unshaven and reeking of punch, 
 to associate with his mother. Even about Emily he 
 faltered when the pitiless guardian began to question 
 him. " Was she accomplished? " He was obliged to 
 own, no. " Was she clever? " Well, she had a very 
 good average intellect: but he could not absolutely say 
 she was clever. " Come, let us see some of her letters." 
 So Pen confessed that he had but those three of which 
 we have made mention and that they were but trivial 
 invitations or answers. 
 
 " She is cautious enough," the Major said, drily. 
 " She is older than you, my poor boy; " and then he 
 apologised with the utmost frankness and humility, and 
 flung himself upon Pen's good feelings, begging the lad 
 to excuse a fond old uncle, who had only his family's 
 honour in view for Arthur was ready to flame up in 
 indignation whenever Miss Costigan's honesty was 
 doubted, and swore that he would never have her name 
 mentioned lightly, and never, never would part from 
 her. 
 
 He repeated this to the uncle and his friends at home, 
 and also, it must be confessed, to Miss Fotheringay and 
 the amiable family at Chatteris, with whom he still con- 
 tinued to spend some portion of his time. Miss Emily 
 was alarmed when she heard of the arrival of Pen's 
 guardian, and rightly conceived that the Major came 
 down with hostile intentions to herself. " I suppose ye 
 intend to leave me, now your grand relation has come 
 down from town. He'll carry ye off, and you'll forget 
 your poor Emily, Mr. Arthur ! " 
 
 Forget her! In her presence, in that of Miss Rouncy,
 
 140 PENDENNIS 
 
 the Columbine and Milly's confidential friend of the 
 Company, in the presence of the Captain himself, Pen 
 swore he never could think of any other woman but his 
 beloved Miss Fotheringay; and the Captain, looking 
 up at his foils, which were hung as a trophy on the wall 
 of the room where Pen and he used to fence, grimly said, 
 he would not advoise any man to meddle rashly with the 
 affections of his darling child; and would never believe 
 his gallant young Arthur, whom he treated as his son, 
 whom he called his son, would ever be guilty of conduct 
 so revolting to every idaya of honour and humanitee. 
 
 He went up and embraced Pen after speaking. He 
 cried, and wiped his eye with one large dirty hand as he 
 clasped Pen with the other. Arthur shuddered in that 
 grasp, and thought of his uncle at home. His father- 
 in-law looked unusually dirty and shabby; the odour of 
 whisky-and-water was even more decided than in com- 
 mon. How was he to bring that man and his mother to- 
 gether? He trembled when he thought that he had 
 absolutely written to Costigan ( inclosing to him a sover- 
 eign, the loan of which the worthy gentleman needed ) , 
 and saying, that one day he hoped to sign himself his 
 affectionate son, Arthur Pendennis. He was glad to 
 get away from Chatteris that day; from Miss Rouncy 
 the confidante; from the old toping father-in-law ; from 
 the divine Emily herself. " O Emily, Emily," he cried 
 inwardly, as he rattled homewards on Rebecca, " you lit- 
 tle know what sacrifices I am making for you! for you 
 who are always so cold, so cautious, so mistrustful! " 
 
 Pen never rode over to Chatteris, but the Major 
 found out on what errand the boy had been. Faithful 
 to his plan, Major Pendennis gave his nephew no let or 
 hindrance; but somehow the constant feeling that the
 
 PENDENNIS 141 
 
 senior's eye was upon him, an uneasy shame attendant 
 upon that inevitable confession which the evening's con- 
 versation would be sure to elicit in the most natural sim- 
 ple manner, made Peri go less frequently to sigh away 
 his soul at the feet of his charmer than he had been wont 
 to do previous to his uncle's arrival. There was no use 
 trying to deceive him; there was no pretext of dining 
 with Smirke, or reading Greek plays with Foker; Pen 
 felt, when he returned from one of his flying visits, that 
 everybody knew whence he came, and appeared quite 
 guilty before his mother and guardian, over their books 
 or their game at picquet. 
 
 Once having walked out half-a-mile, to the Fairoaks' 
 Inn, beyond the Lodge gates, to be in readiness for the 
 Competitor coach, which changed horses there, to take 
 a run for Chatteris, a man on the roof touched his hat 
 to the young gentleman: it was his uncle's man, Mr. 
 Morgan, who was going on a message for his master, 
 and had been took up at the Lodge, as he said. And Mr. 
 Morgan came back by the Rival, too; so that Pen had 
 the pleasure of that domestic's company both ways. 
 Nothing was said at home. The lad seemed to have 
 every decent liberty; and yet he felt himself dimly 
 watched and guarded, and that there were eyes upon him 
 even in the presence of his Dulcinea. 
 
 In fact, Pen's suspicions w r ere not unfounded, and his 
 guardian had sent forth to gather all possible informa- 
 tion regarding the lad and his interesting young friend. 
 The discreet and ingenious Mr. Morgan, a London con- 
 fidential valet, whose fidelity could be trusted, had been 
 to Chatteris more than once, and made every inquiry re- 
 garding the past history and present habits of the Cap- 
 tain and his daughter. He delicately cross-examined the
 
 142 PENDENNIS 
 
 waiters, the ostlers, and all the inmates of the bar at the 
 George, and got from them what little they knew re- 
 specting the worthy Captain. He was not held in very 
 great regard there, as it appeared. The waiters never 
 saw the colour of his money, and were warned not to 
 furnish the poor gentleman with any liquor for which 
 some other party was not responsible. He swaggered 
 sadly about the coffee-room there, consumed a tooth- 
 pick, and looked over the paper, and if any friend asked 
 him to dinner he stayed. 
 
 From the servants of the officers at the barracks Mr. 
 Morgan found that the Captain had so frequently and 
 outrageously inebriated himself there, that Colonel 
 Swallowtail had forbidden him the mess-room. The in- 
 defatigable Morgan then put himself in communication 
 with some of the inferior actors at the theatre, and 
 pumped them over their cigars and punch, and all 
 agreed that Costigan was poor, shabby, and given to 
 debt and to drink. But there was not a breath upon the 
 reputation of Miss Fotheringay: her father's courage 
 was reported to have displayed itself on more than one 
 occasion towards persons disposed to treat his daughter 
 with freedom. She never came to the theatre but with 
 her father: in his most inebriated moments, that gentle- 
 man kept a watch over her; finally Mr. Morgan, from 
 his own experience, added that he had been to see her 
 hact, and was uncommon delighted with the perform- 
 ance, besides thinking her a most splendid woman. 
 
 Mrs. Creed, the pew-opener, confirmed these state- 
 ments to Doctor Portman, who examined her personally. 
 Mrs. Creed had nothing unfavourable to her lodger to 
 divulge. She saw nobody; only one or two ladies of the 
 theatre. The Captain did intoxicate himself sometimes,
 
 PENDENNIS 143 
 
 and did not always pay his rent regularly, but he did 
 when he had money, or rather Miss Fotheringay did. 
 Since the young gentleman from Clavering had been 
 and took lessons in fencing, one or two more had come 
 from the barracks; Sir Derby Oaks, and his young 
 friend, Mr. Foker, which was often together ; and which 
 was always driving over from Baymouth in the tandem. 
 But on the occasions of the lessons, Miss F. was very sel- 
 dom present, and generally came down stairs to Mrs. 
 Creed's own room. 
 
 The Doctor and the Major consulting together as 
 they often did, groaned in spirit over that information. 
 Major Pendennis openly expressed his disappointment; 
 and, I believe, the Divine himself was ill-pleased at not 
 being able to pick a hole in poor Miss Fotheringay's 
 reputation. 
 
 Even about Pen himself, Mrs. Creed's reports were 
 desperately favourable. ' Whenever he come," Mrs. 
 Creed said, " she always have me or one of the children 
 with her. And Mrs. Creed, marm, says she, if you 
 please, marm, you'll on no account leave the room when 
 that young gentleman's here. And many's the time I've 
 seen him a lookin' as if he wished I was away, poor 
 young man : and he took to coming in service time, when 
 I wasn't at home, of course: but she always had one of 
 the boys up if her Pa wasn't at home, or old Mr. Bows 
 with her a teaching of her her lesson, or one of the young 
 ladies of the theayter." 
 
 It was all true: whatever encouragements might have 
 been given him before he avowed his passion, the pru- 
 dence of Miss Emily was prodigious after Pen had de- 
 clared himself: and the poor fellow chafed against her 
 hopeless reserve.
 
 144 PENDENNIS 
 
 The Major surveyed the state of things with a sigh. 
 " If it were but a temporary liaison," the excellent man 
 said, " one could bear it. A young fellow must sow his 
 wild oats, and that sort of thing. But a virtuous attach- 
 ment is the deuce. It comes of the d d romantic notions 
 boys get from being brought up by women." 
 
 " Allow me to say, Major, that you speak a little too 
 like a man of the world," replied the Doctor. " No- 
 thing can be more desirable for Pen than a virtuous 
 attachment for a young lady of his own rank and with 
 a corresponding fortune this present infatuation, of 
 course, I must deplore as sincerely as you do. If I were 
 his guardian I should command him to give it up." 
 
 ' The very means, I tell you, to make him marry to- 
 morrow. We have got time from him, that is all, and 
 we must do our best with that." 
 
 " I say, Major," said the Doctor, at the end of the 
 conversation in which the above subject was discussed 
 " I am not, of course, a play-going man but suppose, 
 I say, we go and see her." 
 
 The Major laughed he had been a fortnight at Fair- 
 oaks, and strange to say, had not thought of that. 
 'Well," he said, "why not? After all, it is not my 
 niece, but Miss Fotheringay the actress, and we have 
 as good a right as any other of the public to see her if 
 we pay our money." So upon a day when it was ar- 
 ranged that Pen was to dine at home, and pass the even- 
 ing with his mother, the two elderly gentlemen drove 
 over to Chatteris in the Doctor's chaise, and there, like 
 a couple of jolly bachelors, dined at the George Inn, 
 before proceeding to the play. 
 
 Only two other guests were in the room, an officer 
 of the regiment quartered at Chatteris, and a young
 
 PENDENNIS 145 
 
 gentleman whom the Doctor thought he had somewhere 
 seen. They left them at their meal, however, and has- 
 tened to the theatre. It was " Hamlet " over again. 
 Shakspeare was Article XL. of stout old Doctor Port- 
 man's creed, to which he always made a point of testi- 
 fying publicly at least once in a year. 
 
 We have described the play before, and how those 
 who saw Miss Fotheringay perform in Ophelia saw pre- 
 cisely the same thing on one night as on another. Both 
 the elderly gentlemen looked at her with extraordinary 
 interest, thinking how very much young Pen was 
 charmed with her. 
 
 " Gad," said the Major, between his teeth, as he sur- 
 veyed her when she was called forward as usual, and 
 swept her curtsies to the scanty audience, " the young 
 rascal has not made a bad choice." 
 
 The Doctor applauded her loudly and loyally. 
 " Upon my word," said he, " she is a very clever actress; 
 and I must say, Major, she is endowed with very consid- 
 erable personal attractions." 
 
 " So that young officer thinks in the stage-box," Ma- 
 jor Pendennis answered, and he pointed out to Doctor 
 Portman's attention the young dragoon of the George 
 Coffee-room, who sate in the box in question, and ap- 
 plauded with immense enthusiasm. She looked ex- 
 tremely sweet upon him too, thought the Major: but 
 that's their way and he shut up his natty opera-glass 
 and pocketed it, as if he wished to see no more that night. 
 Nor did the Doctor, of course, propose to stay for the 
 after-piece, so they rose and left the theatre ; the Doctor 
 returning to Mrs. Portman, who was on a visit at the 
 Deanery, and the Major walking home full of thought 
 towards the George, where he had bespoken a bed.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 FACING THE ENEMY 
 
 [ AUNTERING homewards, Major Pen- 
 dennis reached the hotel presently, 
 and found Mr. Morgan, his faith- 
 ful valet, awaiting him at the door, 
 who stopped his master as he was 
 about to take a candle to go to bed, 
 and said, with his usual air of 
 knowing deference, " I think, sir, 
 if you would go into the coffee- 
 room, there's a young gentleman 
 there as you would like to see." 
 
 " What, is Mr. Arthur here? " 
 the Major said, in great anger. 
 " No, sir but his great friend, Mr. Foker, sir. Lady 
 Hagnes Foker's son is here, sir. He's been asleep in 
 the coffee-room since he took his dinner, and has just 
 rung for his coffee, sir. And I think, p'raps, you might 
 like to git into conversation with him," the valet said, 
 opening the coffee-room door. 
 
 The Major entered; and there indeed was Mr. Foker, 
 the only occupant of the place. He had intended to go 
 to the play too, but sleep had overtaken him after a 
 copious meal, and he had flung up his legs on the bench, 
 and indulged in a nap instead of the dramatic amuse- 
 ment. The Major was meditating how to address the 
 young man, but the latter prevented him that trouble. 
 
 146
 
 PENDENNIS 147 
 
 " Like to look at the evening paper, sir? " said Mr. 
 Foker, who was always communicative and affable ; and 
 he took up the " Globe " from his table, and offered it 
 to the new comer. 
 
 " I am very much obliged to you," said the Major, 
 with a grateful bow and smile. " If I don't mistake the 
 family likeness, I have the pleasure of speaking to Mr. 
 Henry Foker, Lady Agnes Foker's son. I have the 
 happiness to name her ladyship among my acquaintances 
 and you bear, sir, a Rosherville face." 
 
 " Hullo! I beg your pardon," Mr. Foker said, " I 
 took you " he was going to say " I took you for a 
 commercial gent." But he stopped that phrase. ' To 
 whom have I the pleasure of speaking? " he added. 
 
 ' To a relative of a friend and schoolfellow of yours 
 Arthur Pendennis, my nephew, who has often spoken 
 to me about you in terms of great regard. I am Major 
 Pendennis, of whom you may have heard him speak. 
 May I take my soda-water at your table? I have had 
 the pleasure of sitting at your grandfather's." 
 
 " Sir, you do me proud," said Mr. Foker, with much 
 courtesy. " And so you are Arthur Pendennis's uncle, 
 are you? " 
 
 " And guardian," added the Major. 
 
 " He's as good a fellow as ever stepped, sir," said Mr. 
 Foker. 
 
 " I am glad you think so." 
 
 "And clever, too I was always a stupid chap, I was 
 but you see, sir, I know 'em when they are clever, and 
 like 'em of that sort." 
 
 * You show your taste and your modesty, too," said 
 the Major. " I have heard Arthur repeatedly speak of 
 you, and he said your talents were very good."
 
 148 PENDENNIS 
 
 " I'm not good at the books," Mr. Foker said, wag- 
 ging his head " never could manage that Pendennis 
 could he used to do half the chaps' verses and yet you 
 are his guardian; and I hope you will pardon me for 
 saying that I think he's what we call a flat," the candid 
 young gentleman said. 
 
 The Major found himself on the instant in the midst 
 of a most interesting and confidential conversation. 
 "And how is Arthur a flat? " he asked, with a smile. 
 
 ' You know," Foker answered, winking at him he 
 would have winked at the Duke of Wellington with just 
 as little scruple. * You know Arthur's a flat, about 
 women, I mean." 
 
 " He is not the first of us, my dear Mr. Harry," an- 
 swered the Major. ' I have heard something of this 
 but pray tell me more." 
 
 ' Why, sir, you see it's partly my fault. We went 
 to the play one night, and Pen was struck all of a heap 
 with Miss Fotheringay Costigan her real name is an 
 uncommon fine gal she is too; and the next morning I 
 introduced him to the General, as we call her father 
 a regular old scamp and such a boy for the whisky-and- 
 water and he's gone on being intimate there. And he's 
 fallen in love with her and I'm blessed if he hasn't pro- 
 posed to her," Foker said, slapping his hand on the table, 
 until all the dessert began to jingle. 
 
 " What! you know it too? " asked the Major. 
 
 " Know it! don't I? and many more too. We were 
 talking about it at mess, yesterday, and chaffing Derby 
 Oaks until he was as mad as a hatter. Know Sir Derby 
 Oaks? We dined together, and he went to the play: 
 we were standing at the door smoking, I remember, when 
 you passed in to dinner."
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 149 
 
 " I remember Sir Thomas Oaks, his father, before he 
 was a Baronet or a Knight; he lived in Cavendish 
 Square, and was Physician to Queen Charlotte." 
 
 r 
 
 (0 
 
 * The young one is making the money spin, I can tell 
 you," Mr. Foker said. 
 
 " And is Sir Derby Oaks," the Major said, with great 
 delight and anxiety, " another soupirant? " 
 " Another what ? " inquired Mr. Foker. 
 " Another admirer of Miss Fotheringay? " 
 ' Lord bless you! we call him Mondays, Wednesdays, 
 and Fridays, and Pen Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Satur- 
 days. But mind you, nothing wrong! No, no! Miss
 
 150 PENDENNIS 
 
 F. is a deal too wide awake for that, Major Pendennis. 
 She plays one off against the other. What you call two 
 strings to her bow." 
 
 " I think you seem tolerably wide awake, too, Mr. 
 Foker," Pendennis said, laughing. 
 
 " Pretty well, thank you, sir how are you? " Foker 
 replied, imperturbably. "I'm not clever, p'raps: but 
 I am rather downy; and partial friends say I know 
 what's o'clock tolerably well. Can I tell you the time 
 of day in any way? " 
 
 " Upon my word," the Major answered, quite de- 
 lighted, " I think you may be of very great service to 
 me. You are a young man of the world, and with such 
 one likes to deal. And as such I need not inform you 
 that our family is by no means delighted at this absurd 
 intrigue in which Arthur is engaged.'* 
 
 " I should rather think not," said Mr. Foker. " Con- 
 nexion not eligible. Too much beer drunk on the prem- 
 ises. No Irish need apply. That I take to be your 
 meaning." 
 
 The Major said it was, exactly: and he proceeded to 
 examine his new acquaintance regarding the amiable 
 family into which his nephew proposed to enter, and soon 
 got from the candid witness a number of particulars 
 regarding the House of Costigan. 
 
 We must do Mr. Foker the justice to say that he spoke 
 most favourably of Mr. and Miss Costigan's moral char- 
 acter. ' You see," said he, " I think the General is fond 
 of the jovial bowl, and if I wanted to be very certain 
 of my money, it isn't in his pocket I'd invest it but 
 he has always kept a watchful eye on his daughter, and 
 neither he nor she will stand anything but what's hon- 
 ourable. Pen's attentions to her are talked about in the 
 whole Company, and I hear all about them from a young
 
 PENDENNIS 151 
 
 lady who used to be very intimate with her, and with 
 whose family I sometimes take tea in a friendly way. 
 Miss Rouncy says Sir Derby Oaks has been hanging 
 about Miss Fotheringay ever since his regiment has been 
 down here ; but Pen has come in and cut him out lately, 
 which has made the Baronet so mad, that he has been 
 very near on the point of proposing too. Wish he would ; 
 and you'd see which of the two Miss Fotheringay would 
 jump at." 
 
 " I thought as much," the Major said. ' You give 
 me a great deal of pleasure, Mr. Foker. I wish I could 
 have seen you before." 
 
 " Didn't like to put in my oar," replied the other. 
 " Don't speak till I'm asked, when, if there's no objec- 
 tions, I speak pretty freely. Heard your man had been 
 hankering about my servant didn't know myself what 
 was going on until Miss Fotheringay and Miss Rouncy 
 had the row about the ostrich feathers, when Miss R. 
 told me everything." 
 
 " Miss Rouncy, I gather, was the confidante of the 
 other." 
 
 " Confidant? I believe you. Why, she's twice as 
 clever a girl as Fotheringay, and literary and that, while 
 Miss Foth can't do much more than read." 
 
 " She can write," said the Major, remembering Pen's 
 breast-pocket. 
 
 Foker broke out into a sardonic " He, he! Rouncy 
 writes her letters," he said : " every one of 'em ; and since 
 they've quarrelled, she don't know how the deuce to get 
 on. Miss Rouncy is an uncommon pretty hand, whereas 
 the other one makes dreadful work of the writing and 
 spelling when Bows ain't by. Rouncy's been settin' her 
 copies lately she writes a beautiful hand, Rouncy 
 does."
 
 152 PENDENNIS 
 
 " I suppose you know it pretty well," said the Major, 
 archly : upon which Mr. Foker winked at him again. 
 
 " I would give a great deal to have a specimen of her 
 handwriting," continued Major Pendennis, " I dare say 
 you could give me one." 
 
 " That would be too bad," Foker replied. " Miss F.'s 
 writin' ain't so very bad, I dare say; only she got Miss 
 R. to write the first letter, and has gone on ever since. 
 But you mark my word, that till they are friends again 
 the letters will stop." 
 
 " I hope they will never be reconciled," the Major said 
 with great sincerity. ' You must feel, my dear sir, as 
 a man of the world, how fatal to my nephew's prospects 
 in life is this step which he contemplates, and how eager 
 we all must be to free him from this absurd engagement." 
 
 " He has come out uncommon strong," said Mr. Fo- 
 ker; " I have seen his verses; Rouncy copied 'em. And 
 I said to myself when I saw 'em, 'Catch me writin' verses 
 to a woman, that's all.' ' 
 
 " He has made a fool of himself, as many a good fel- 
 low has before him. How can we make him see his folly, 
 and cure it? I am sure you will give us what aid you 
 can in extricating a generous young man from such a 
 pair of schemers as this father and daughter seem to be. 
 Love on the lady's side is out of the question." 
 
 " Love, indeed! " Foker said. " If Pen hadn't two 
 thousand a-year when he came of age 
 
 ;< If Pen hadn't what? " cried out the Major in aston- 
 ishment. 
 
 ' Two thousand a-year: hasn't he got two thousand 
 a-year? the General says he has." 
 
 " My dear friend," shrieked out the Major, with an 
 eagerness which this gentleman rarely showed, " thank
 
 PENDENNIS 153 
 
 you thank you! I begin to see now. Two thousand 
 a-year ! Why, his mother has but five hundred a-year in 
 the world. She is likely to live to eighty, and Arthur 
 has not a shilling but what she can allow him." 
 " What! he ain't rich, then? " Foker asked. 
 " Upon my honour he has no more than what I say." 
 " And you ain't going to leave him anything? " 
 The Major had sunk every shilling he could scrape 
 together on annuity, and of course was going to leave 
 Pen nothing ; but he did not tell Foker this. " How 
 much do you think a Major on half -pay can save? " he 
 asked. " If these people have been looking at him as a 
 fortune, they are utterly mistaken and and you have 
 made me the happiest man in the world." 
 
 " Sir to YOU," said Mr. Foker, politely, and when they 
 parted for the night they shook hands with the greatest 
 cordiality; the younger gentleman promising the elder 
 not to leave Chatteris without a further conversation in 
 the morning. And as the Major went up to his room, 
 and Mr. Foker smoked his cigar against the door pil- 
 lars of the George, Pen, very likely, ten miles off, was 
 lying in bed kissing the letter from his Emily. 
 
 The next morning before Mr. Foker drove off in his 
 drag, the insinuating Major had actually got a letter of 
 Miss Rouncy's in his own pocket-book. Let it be a les- 
 son to women how they write. And in very high spirits 
 Major Pendennis went to call upon Doctor Portman at 
 the Deanery, and told him what happy discoveries he 
 had made on the previous night. As they sate in con- 
 fidential conversation in the Dean's oak breakfast par- 
 lour they could look across the lawn and see Captain 
 Costigan's window, at which poor Pen had been only too 
 visible some three weeks since. . The Doctor was most
 
 154 PENDENNIS 
 
 indignant against Mrs. Creed, the landlady, for her du- 
 plicity, in concealing Sir Derby Oaks's constant visits 
 to her lodgers, and threatened to excommunicate her out 
 of the Cathedral. But the wary Major thought that 
 all things were for the best ; and, having taken counsel 
 with himself over night, felt himself quite strong enough 
 to go and face Captain Costigan. 
 
 " I'm going to fight the dragon," he said, with a 
 laugh, to Doctor Portman. 
 
 " And I shrive you, sir, and bid good fortune go with 
 you," answered the Doctor. Perhaps he and Mrs. Port- 
 man and Miss Mira, as they sate with their friend, the 
 Dean's lady, in her drawing-room, looked up more than 
 once at the enemy's window to see if they could perceive 
 any signs of the combat. 
 
 The Major walked round, according to the directions 
 given him, and soon found Mrs. Creed's little door. He 
 passed it, and as he ascended to Captain Costigan's 
 apartment, he could hear a stamping of feet, and a great 
 shouting of " Ha, ha! " within. 
 
 " It's Sir Derby Oaks taking his fencing lesson," said 
 the child, who piloted Major Pendennis. " He takes it 
 Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays." 
 
 The Major knocked, and at length a tall gentleman 
 came forth, with a foil and mask in one hand, and a 
 fencing glove on the other. 
 
 Pendennis made him a deferential bow. " I believe 
 I have the honour of speaking to Captain Costigan 
 My name is Major Pendennis." 
 
 The Captain brought his weapon up to the salute, and 
 said, "Major, the honer is moine; I'm deloighted to 
 see ye."
 
 The General's Salutation 
 of the Major
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 NEGOTIATION 
 
 Major and Captain Cos- 
 tigan were old soldiers and ac- 
 customed to face the enemy, 
 so we may presume that they 
 retained their presence of 
 mind perfectly: but the rest 
 of the party assembled in 
 Cos's sitting-room were, per- 
 haps, a little flurried at Pen- 
 dennis's apparition. Miss 
 Fotheringay's slow heart began to beat no doubt, for 
 her cheek flushed up with a great healthy blush, as Lieu- 
 tenant Sir Derby Oaks looked at her with a scowl. The 
 little crooked old man in the window-seat, who had been 
 witnessing the fencing-match between the two gentle- 
 men (whose stamping and jumping had been such as 
 to cause him to give up all attempts to continue writing 
 the theatre music, in the copying of which he had been 
 engaged) looked up eagerly towards the new comer as 
 the Major of the well-blacked boots entered the apart- 
 ment, distributing the most graceful bows to everybody 
 present. 
 
 " Me daughter me friend, Mr. Bows me gallant 
 young pupil and friend, I may call 'um, Sir Derby 
 Oaks," said Costigan, splendidly waving his hand, and 
 pointing each of these individuals to the Major's at- 
 
 155
 
 156 PENDENNIS 
 
 tention. " In one moment, Meejor, I'm your humble 
 servant," and to dash into the little adjoining chamber 
 where he slept, to give a twist to his lank hair with his 
 hair-brush (a wonderful and ancient piece), to tear off 
 his old stock and put on a new one which Emily had 
 constructed for him, and to assume a handsome clean 
 collar, and the new coat which had been ordered upon 
 the occasion of Miss Fotheringay's benefit, was with the 
 still active Costigan the work of a minute. 
 
 After him Sir Derby entered, and presently emerged 
 from the same apartment, where he also cased himself 
 in his little shell- jacket, which fitted tightly upon the 
 young officer's big person; and which he and Miss 
 Fotheringay, and poor Pen too, perhaps, admired pro- 
 digiously. 
 
 Meanwhile conversation was engaged in between the 
 actress and the new comer ; and the usual remarks about 
 the weather had been interchanged before Costigan re- 
 entered in his new " shoot," as he called it. 
 
 " I needn't apologoise to ye, Meejor," he said, in his 
 richest and most courteous manner, " for receiving ye 
 in me shirt-sleeves." 
 
 " An old soldier can't be better employed than in 
 teaching a young one the use of his sword," answered the 
 Major, gallantly. " I remember in old times hearing 
 that you could use yours pretty well, Captain Costigan." 
 
 " What, ye've heard of Jack Costigan, Major," said 
 the other, greatly. 
 
 The Major had, indeed; he had pumped his nephew 
 concerning his new friend, the Irish officer; and said 
 that he perfectly well recollected meeting Mr. Costigan, 
 and hearing him sing at Sir Richard Strachan's table 
 at Walcheren.
 
 PENDENNIS 157 
 
 At this information, and the bland and cordial manner 
 in which it was conveyed, Bows looked up, entirely puz- 
 zled. " But we will talk of these matters another time," 
 the Major continued, perhaps not wishing to commit 
 himself; " it is to Miss Fotheringay that I came to pay 
 my respects to-day:" and he performed another bow 
 for her, so courtly and gracious, that if she had been a 
 duchess he could not have made it more handsome. 
 
 " I had heard of your performances from my nephew, 
 madam," the Major said, " who raves about you, as I 
 believe you know pretty well. But Arthur is but a boy, 
 and a wild enthusiastic young fellow, whose opinions 
 one must not take au pied de la lettre; and I confess I 
 was anxious to judge for myself. Permit me to say your 
 performance delighted and astonished me. I have seen 
 our best actresses, and, on my word, I think you surpass 
 them all. You are as majestic as Mrs. Siddons." 
 
 " Faith, I always said so," Costigan said, winking at 
 his daughter: "Major, take a chair." Milly rose at 
 this hint, took an unripped satin garment off the only 
 vacant seat, and brought the latter to Major Pendennis 
 with one of her finest curtseys. 
 
 ' You are as pathetic as Miss O'Neill," he continued, 
 bowing and seating himself; " your snatches of song re- 
 mind me of Mrs. Jordan in her best time, when we were 
 young men, Captain Costigan; and your manner re- 
 minded me of Mars. Did you ever see the Mars, Miss 
 Fotheringay? " 
 
 ' There was two Mahers in Crow Street," remarked 
 Miss Emily: "Fanny was well enough, but Biddy was 
 no great things." 
 
 " Sure, the Major means the god of war, Milly, my 
 dear," interposed the parent.
 
 158 PENDENNIS 
 
 " It is not that Mars I meant, though Venus, I sup- 
 pose, may be pardoned for thinking about him ; " the 
 Major replied with a smile directed in full to Sir Derby 
 Oaks, who now re-entered in his shell- jacket, but the 
 lady did not understand the words of which he made 
 use, not did the compliment at all pacify Sir Derby, 
 who, probably, did not understand it either, and at any 
 rate received it with great sulkiness and stiffness ; scowl- 
 ing uneasily at Miss Fotheringay, with an expression 
 which seemed to ask what the deuce does this man here? 
 
 Major Pendennis was not in the least annoyed by 
 the gentleman's ill-humour. On the contrary, it de- 
 lighted him. " So," thought he, " a rival is in the field; " 
 and he offered up vows that Sir Derby might be, not 
 only a rival, but a winner too, in this love-match in which 
 he and Pen were engaged. 
 
 " I fear I interrupted your fencing lesson ; but my 
 stay in Chatteris is very short, and I was anxious to 
 make myself known to my old fellow-campaigner Cap- 
 tain Costigan, and to see a lady nearer who had charmed 
 me so much from the stage. I was not the only man 
 cpris last night, Miss Fotheringay (if I must call you 
 so, though your own family name is a very ancient and 
 noble one ) . There was a reverend friend of mine, who 
 went home in raptures with Ophelia; and I saw Sir 
 Derby Oaks fling a bouquet which no actress ever mer- 
 ited better. I should have brought one myself, had I 
 known what I was going to see. Are not those the very 
 flowers in a glass of water on the mantel-piece yonder? " 
 
 " I am very fond of flowers," said Miss Fotheringay, 
 with a languishing ogle at Sir Derby Oaks but the 
 Baronet still scowled sulkily. 
 
 " Sweets to the sweet isn't that the expression of the
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 159 
 
 play? " Major Pendennis asked, bent upon being good- 
 humoured. 
 
 " 'Pon my life, I don't know. Very likely it is. I 
 ain't much of a literary man," answered Sir Derby. 
 
 " Is it possible? " the Major continued, with an air of 
 surprise. ' You don't inherit your father's love of let- 
 ters, then, Sir Derby? He was a remarkably fine 
 scholar, and I had the honour of knowing him very 
 well."
 
 160 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Indeed," said the other, and gave a sulky wag of 
 his head. 
 
 " He saved my life," continued Pendennis. 
 
 " Did he now? " cried Miss Fotheringay, rolling her 
 eyes first upon the Major with surprise, then towards 
 Sir Derby with gratitude but the latter was proof 
 against those glances; and far from appearing to be 
 pleased that the Apothecary, his father, should have 
 saved Major Pendennis's life, the young man actually 
 looked as if he wished the event had turned the other 
 way. 
 
 " My father, I believe, was a very good doctor," the 
 young gentleman said by way of reply. " I'm not in 
 that line myself. I wish you good morning, sir. I've 
 got an appointment Cos, bye-bye Miss Fotheringay, 
 good morning." And, in spite of the young lady's 
 imploring looks and appealing smiles, the Dragoon 
 bowed stiffly out of the room, and the clatter of his sabre 
 was heard as he strode down the creaking stair ; and the 
 angry tones of his voice as he cursed little Tom Creed, 
 who was disporting in the passage, and whose peg-top 
 Sir Derby kicked away with an oath into the street. 
 
 The Major did not smile in the least, though he had 
 every reason to be amused. " Monstrous handsome 
 young man that as fine a looking soldier as ever I saw," 
 he said to Costigan. 
 
 " A credit to the army and to human nature in gen- 
 eral," answered Costigan. " A young man of refoined 
 manners, polite affabilitee, and princely fortune. His 
 table is sumptuous: he's adawr'd in the regiment: and 
 he rides sixteen stone." 
 
 " A perfect champion," said the Major, laughing. 
 " I have no doubt all the ladies admire him."
 
 PENDENNIS 161 
 
 " He's very well, in spite of his weight, now he's 
 young," said Milly; "but he's no conversation." 
 
 " He's best on horseback," Mr. Bows said; on which 
 Milly replied, that the Baronet had ridden third in the 
 steeple-chase on his horse Tareaways, and the Major 
 began to comprehend that the young lady herself was 
 not of a particular genius, and to wonder how she should 
 be so stupid and act so well. 
 
 Costigan, with Irish hospitality, of course pressed re- 
 freshment upon his guest: and the Major, who was no 
 more hungry than you are after a Lord Mayor's dinner, 
 declared that he should like a biscuit and a glass of wine 
 above all things, as he felt quite faint from long fasting 
 but he knew that to receive small kindnesses flatters 
 the donors very much, and that people must needs grow 
 well disposed towards you as they give you their hos- 
 pitality. 
 
 " Some of the old Madara, Milly, love," Costigan 
 said, winking to his child and that lady, turning to 
 her father a glance of intelligence, went out of the room, 
 and down the stair, where she softly summoned her little 
 emissary Master Tommy Creed : and giving him a piece 
 of money, ordered him to go buy a pint of Madara wine 
 at the Grapes, and sixpennyworth of sorted biscuits at 
 the baker's, and to return in a hurry, when he might 
 have two biscuits for himself. 
 
 Whilst Tommy Creed was gone on this errand, Miss 
 Costigan sate below with Mrs. Creed, telling her land- 
 lady how Mr. Arthur Pendennis's uncle, the Major, was 
 above stairs; a nice, soft-spoken old gentleman; that 
 butter wouldn't melt in his mouth : and how Sir Derby 
 had gone out of the room in a rage of jealousy, and 
 thinking what must be done to pacify both of them.
 
 162 PENDENNIS 
 
 " She keeps the keys of the cellar, Major," said Mr. 
 Costigan, as the girl left the room. 
 
 " Upon my word you have a very beautiful butler," 
 answered Pendennis, gallantly, " and I don't wonder at 
 the young fellows raving about her. When we were 
 of their age, Captain Costigan, I think plainer women 
 would have done our business." 
 
 " Faith, and ye may say that, sir and lucky is the 
 man who gets her. Ask me friend Bob Bows here 
 whether Miss Fotheringay's moind is not even shupa- 
 rior to her person, and whether she does not possess a 
 cultiveated intellect, a refoined understanding, and an 
 emiable disposition." 
 
 " O, of course," said Mr. Bows, rather drily. " Here 
 comes Hebe blushing from the cellar. Don't you think 
 it is time to go to rehearsal, Miss Hebe? You will be 
 fined if you are late " and he gave the young lady a 
 look, which intimated that they had much better leave 
 the room and the two elders together. 
 
 At this order Miss Hebe took up her bonnet and 
 shawl, looking uncommonly pretty, good-humoured, and 
 smiling: and Bows gathered up his roll of papers, and 
 hobbled across the room for his hat and cane. 
 
 " Must you go? " said the Major. " Can't you give 
 us a few minutes more, Miss Fotheringay? Before you 
 leave us, permit an old fellow to shake you by the hand, 
 and believe that I am proud to have had the honour of 
 making your acquaintance, and am most sincerely 
 anxious to be your friend." 
 
 Miss Fotheringay made a low curtsey at the conclu- 
 sion of this gallant speech, and the Major followed her 
 retreating steps to the door, where he squeezed her hand 
 with the kindest and most paternal pressure. Bows was 
 puzzled with this exhibition of cordiality: " The lad's
 
 PENDENNIS 163 
 
 relatives can't be really wanting to marry him to her," 
 he thought and so they departed. 
 
 " Now for it," thought Major Pendennis; and as for 
 Mr. Costigan he profited instantaneously by his daugh- 
 ter's absence to drink up the rest of the wine ; and tossed 
 off one bumper after another of the Madeira from the 
 Grapes, with an eager shaking hand. The Major came 
 up to the table, and took up his glass and drained it with 
 a jovial smack. If it had been Lord Steyne's particu- 
 lar, and not public-house Cape, ,he could not have ap- 
 peared to relish it more. 
 
 " Capital Madeira, Captain Costigan," he said. 
 ' Where do you get it? I drink the health of that 
 charming creature in a bumper. Faith, Captain, I don't 
 wonder that the men are wild about her. I never saw 
 such eyes in my life, or such a grand manner. I am sure 
 she is as intellectual as she is beautiful; and I have no 
 doubt she's as good as she is clever." 
 
 " A good girl, sir, a good girl, sir," said the delighted 
 father; " and I pledge a toast to her with all my heart. 
 Shall I send to the to the cellar for another pint? It's 
 handy by. No? Well, indeed, sir, ye may say she is a 
 good girl, and the pride and glory of her father honest 
 old Jack Costigan. The man who gets her will have a 
 jew'l to a wife, sir; and I drink his health, sir, and ye 
 know who I mean, Major." 
 
 " I am not surprised at young or old falling in love 
 with her," said the Major, " and frankly must tell you, 
 that though I was very angry with my poor nephew Ar- 
 thur, when I heard of the boy's passion now I have seen 
 the lady I can pardon him any extent of it. By George, 
 I should like to enter for the race myself, if I weren't an 
 old fellow and a poor one." 
 
 " And no better man, Major, I'm sure," cried Jack,
 
 164 PENDENNIS 
 
 enraptured. ' Your friendship, sir, delights me. Your 
 admiration for my girl brings tears to me eyes tears, 
 sir manlee tears and when she leaves me humble home 
 for your own more splendid mansion, I hope she'll keep 
 a place for her poor old father, poor old Jack Costigan." 
 The Captain suited the action to the word, and his 
 blood-shot eyes were suffused with water, as he addressed 
 the Major. 
 
 " Your sentiments do you honour," the other said. 
 " But, Captain Costigan, I can't help smiling at one 
 thing you have just said." 
 
 " And what's that, sir? " asked Jack, who was at a too 
 heroic and sentimental pitch to descend from it. 
 
 ' You were speaking about our splendid mansion 
 my sister's house, I mean." 
 
 " I mane the park and mansion of Arthur Pendennis, 
 Esquire, of Fairoaks Park, whom I hope to see a Mim- 
 ber of Parliament for his native town of Clavering, when 
 he is of ege to take that responsible stetion," cried the 
 Captain with much dignity. 
 
 The Major smiled. " Fairoaks Park, my dear sirl " 
 he said. " Do you know our history? We are of exces- 
 sively ancient family certainly, but I began life with 
 scarce enough money to purchase my commission, and 
 my eldest brother was a country apothecary : who made 
 every shilling he died possessed of out of his pestle and 
 mortar." 
 
 " I have consented to waive that objection, sir," said 
 Costigan majestically, "in consideration of the known 
 respectability of your family." 
 
 "Curse your impudence," thought the Major; but 
 he only smiled and bowed. 
 
 ' The Costigans, too, have met with misfortunes ; and
 
 PENDENNIS 165 
 
 our house of Castle Costigan is by no manes what it was. 
 I have known very honest men apothecaries, sir, and 
 there's some in Dublin that has had the honour of dining 
 at the Lord Leftenant's teeble." 
 
 ' You are very kind to give us the benefit of your 
 charity," the Major continued: " but permit me to say 
 that is not the question. You spoke just now of my 
 little nephew as heir of Fairoaks Park, and I don't know 
 what besides." 
 
 " Funded property, I've no doubt, Meejor, and some- 
 thing handsome eventually from yourself." 
 
 " My good sir, I tell you the boy is the son of a coun- 
 try apothecary," cried out Major Pendennis; " and that 
 when he comes of age he won't have a shilling." 
 
 " Pooh, Major, you're laughing at me," said Mr. Cos- 
 tigan, " me young friend, I make no doubt, is heir to two 
 thousand pounds a-year." 
 
 " Two thousand fiddlesticks! I beg your pardon, my 
 dear sir; but has the boy been humbugging you? it is 
 not his habit. Upon my word and honour, as a gentle- 
 man and an executor to my brother's will too, he left lit- 
 tle more than five hundred a-year behind him." 
 
 " And with aconomy, a handsome sum of money too, 
 sir," the Captain answered. " Faith, I've known a man 
 drink his clar't, and drive his coach-and-f our, on five hun- 
 dred a-year and strict aconomy, in Ireland, sir. We'll 
 manage on it, sir trust Jack Costigan for that." 
 
 "My dear Captain Costigan I give you my word 
 that my brother did not leave a shilling to his son 
 Arthur." 
 
 " Are ye joking with me, Meejor Pendennis? " cried 
 Jack Costigan. " Are ye thrifling with the feelings of 
 a father and a gentleman? "
 
 166 PENDENNIS 
 
 " I am telling you the honest truth," said Major Pen- 
 dennis. " Every shilling my brother had, he left to his 
 widow: with a partial reversion, it is true, to the boy. 
 But she is a young woman, and may marry if he offends 
 her or she may outlive him, for she comes of an un- 
 commonly long-lived family. And I ask you, as a gen- 
 tleman and a man of the world, what allowance can my 
 sister, Mrs. Pendennis, make to her son out of five hun- 
 dred a-year, which is all her fortune that shall enable 
 him to maintain himself and your daughter in the rank 
 befitting such an accomplished young lady? " 
 
 " Am I to understand, sir, that the young gentleman, 
 your nephew, and whom I have fosthered and cherished 
 as the son of me bosom, is an imposther who has been 
 thrifling with the affections of me beloved child?" ex- 
 claimed the General, with an outbreak of wrath. " Have 
 a care, sir, how you thrifle with the honour of John Cos- 
 tigan. If I thought any mortal man meant to do so, be 
 heavens I'd have his blood, sir were he old or young." 
 
 " Mr. Costigan! " cried out the Major. 
 
 " Mr. Costigan can protect his own and his daughter's 
 honour, and will, sir," said the other. " Look at that 
 chest of dthrawers, it contains heaps of letthers that that 
 viper has addressed to that innocent child. There's 
 promises there, sir, enough to fill a band-box with ; and 
 when I have dragged the scoundthrel before the Courts 
 of Law, and shown up his perjury and his dishonour, I 
 have another remedy in yondther mahogany case, sir, 
 which shall set me right, sir, with any individual ye 
 mark me words, Major Pendennis with any individual 
 who has counselled your nephew to insult a soldier and a 
 gentleman. What? Me daughter to be jilted, and me 
 gray hairs dishonoured by an apothecary's son! By the
 
 PENDENNIS 167 
 
 laws of Heaven, sir, I should like to see the man that 
 shall do it." 
 
 " I am to understand then that you threaten in the 
 first place to publish the letters of a boy of eighteen to a 
 woman of eight-and-twenty : and afterwards to do me 
 the honour of calling me out," the Major said, still with 
 perfect coolness. 
 
 ' You have described my intentions with perfect ac- 
 curacy, Meejor Pendennis," answered the Captain, as 
 he pulled his ragged whiskers over his chin. 
 
 " Well, well; these shall be the subjects of future ar- 
 rangements, but before we come to powder and ball, my 
 good sir, do have the kindness to think with yourself 
 in what earthly way I have injured you? I have told 
 you that my nephew is dependent upon his mother, who 
 has scarcely more than five hundred a-year." 
 
 " I have my own opinion of the correctness of that 
 assertion," said the Captain. 
 
 ' Will you go to my sister's lawyers, Messrs. Tatham 
 here, and satisfy yourself? " 
 
 " I decline to meet those gentlemen," said the Captain, 
 with rather a disturbed air. " If it be as you say, I have 
 been athrociously deceived by some one, and on that 
 person I'll be revenged." 
 
 " Is it my nephew? " cried the Major, starting up and 
 putting on his hat. " Did he ever tell you that his prop- 
 erty was two thousand a-year? If he did, I'm mistaken 
 in the boy. To tell lies has not been a habit in our 
 family, Mr. Costigan, and I don't think my brother's 
 son has learned it as yet. Try and consider whether you 
 have not deceived yourself; or adopted extravagant re- 
 ports from hearsay. As for me, sir, you are at liberty 
 to understand that I am not afraid of all the Costigans
 
 168 PENDENNIS 
 
 in Ireland, and know quite well how to defend myself 
 against any threats from any quarter. I come here as 
 the boy's guardian to protest against a marriage, most 
 absurd and unequal, that cannot but bring poverty and 
 misery with it: and in preventing it I conceive I am 
 quite as much your daughter's friend (who I have no 
 doubt is an honourable young lady), as the friend of 
 my own family: and prevent the marriage I will, sir, 
 by every means in my power. There, I have said my 
 say, sir." 
 
 " But I have not said mine, Major Pendennis and 
 ye shall hear more from me," Mr. Costigan said, with 
 a look of tremendous severity. 
 
 ' 'Sdeath, sir, what do you mean? " the Major asked, 
 turning round on the threshold of the door, and looking 
 the intrepid Costigan in the face. 
 
 * Ye said, in the course of conversation, that ye were 
 at the George Hotel, I think," Mr. Costigan said in a 
 stately manner. " A friend shall wait upon ye there 
 before ye leave town, sir." 
 
 " Let him make haste, Mr. Costigan," cried out the 
 Major, almost beside himself with rage. " I wish you 
 a good morning, sir." And Captain Costigan bowed 
 a magnificent bow of defiance to Major Pendennis 
 over the landing-place as the latter retreated down the 
 stairs.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 IN WHICH A SHOOTING MATCH IS PROPOSED 
 
 ARLY mention has 
 been made in this his- 
 tory of Mr. Garbetts, 
 Principal Tragedian, 
 a promising and ath- 
 letic young actor, of 
 jovial habits and ir- 
 regular inclinations, 
 between whom and 
 Mr. Costigan there 
 was a considerable in- 
 timacy. They were 
 the chief ornaments 
 of the convivial club 
 held at the Magpie 
 Hotel ; they helped 
 each other in various 
 bill transactions in which they had been engaged, with 
 the mutual loan of each other's valuable signatures. 
 They were friends, in fine ; and Mr. Garbetts was called 
 in by Captain Costigan immediately after Major Pen- 
 dennis had quitted the house, as a friend proper to be 
 consulted at the actual juncture. He was a large man, 
 with a loud voice and fierce aspect, who had the finest 
 legs of the whole company, and could break a poker in 
 mere sport across his stalwart arm. 
 
 169
 
 170 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Run, Tommy," said Mr. Costigan to the little mes- 
 senger, " and fetch Mr. Garbetts from his lodgings over 
 the tripe shop, ye know, and tell 'em to send two glasses 
 of whisky and water, hot, from the Grapes." So 
 Tommy went his way; and presently Mr. Garbetts and 
 the whisky came. 
 
 Captain Costigan did not disclose to him the whole 
 of the previous events, of which the reader is in posses- 
 sion ; but, with the aid of the spirits and water, he com- 
 posed a letter of a threatening nature to Major Pen- 
 dennis's address, in which he called upon that gentle- 
 man to offer no hindrance to the marriage projected be- 
 tween Mr. Arthur Pendennis and his daughter, Miss 
 Fotheringay, and to fix an early day for its celebration : 
 or, in any other case, to give him the satisfaction which 
 was usual between gentlemen of honour. And should 
 Major Pendennis be disinclined to this alternative, the 
 Captain hinted, that he would force him to accept it by 
 the use of a horsewhip, which he should employ upon 
 the Major's person. The precise terms of this letter 
 we cannot give, for reasons which shall be specified pres- 
 ently; but it was, no doubt, couched in the Captain's 
 finest style, and sealed elaborately with the great silver 
 seal of the Costigans the only bit of the family plate 
 which the Captain possessed. 
 
 Garbetts was despatched, then, with this message and 
 letter; and bidding Heaven bless 'um, the General 
 squeezed his ambassador's hand, and saw him depart. 
 Then he took down his venerable and murderous duel- 
 ling-pistols, with flint locks, that had done the business 
 of many a pretty fellow in Dublin: and having ex- 
 amined these, and seen that they were in a satisfactory 
 condition, he brought from the drawer all Pen's letters
 
 PENDENNIS 171 
 
 and poems which he kept there, and which he always 
 read before he permitted his Emily to enjoy their 
 perusal. 
 
 In a score of minutes Garbetts came back with an 
 anxious and crest-fallen countenance. 
 
 ' Ye've seen 'um? " the Captain said. 
 
 ' Why, yes," said Garbetts. 
 
 " And when is it for? asked Costigan, trying 
 the lock of one of the ancient pistols, and bringing 
 it to a level with his oi as he called that blood-shot 
 orb. 
 
 " When is what for? " asked Mr. Garbetts. 
 
 ' The meeting, my dear fellow? " 
 
 ' You don't mean to say you mean mortal combat, 
 Captain?" Garbetts said, aghast. 
 
 ' What the devil else do I mean, Garbetts? I want 
 to shoot that man that has tra juiced me honor, or meself 
 dthrop a victim on the sod." 
 
 " D if I carry challenges," Mr. Garbetts replied. 
 " I'm a family man, Captain, and will have nothing to 
 do with pistols take back your letter; " and, to the sur- 
 prise and indignation of Captain Costigan, his emissary 
 flung the letter down, with its great sprawling super- 
 scription and blotched seal. 
 
 * Ye don't mean to say ye saw 'um and didn't give 
 'um the letter? " cried out the Captain, in a fury. 
 
 " I saw him, but I could not have speech with him, 
 Captain," said Mr. Garbetts. 
 
 " And why the devil not? " asked the other. 
 
 " There was one there I cared not to meet, nor would 
 you," the tragedian answered in a sepulchral voice. 
 " The minion Tatham was there, Captain." 
 
 "The cowardly scoundthrel I " roared Costigan.
 
 172 PENDENNIS 
 
 " He's frightened, and already going to swear the peace 
 against me." 
 
 " I'll have nothing to do with the fighting, mark that," 
 the tragedian doggedly said, " and I wish I'd not seen 
 Tatham neither, nor that bit of 
 
 " Hold your tongue ! Bob Acres. It's my belief ye're 
 no better than a coward," said Captain Costigan, quot- 
 ing Sir Lucius O'Trigger, which character he had per- 
 formed with credit, both off and on the stage, and after 
 some more parley between the couple they separated 
 in not very good humour. 
 
 Their colloquy has been here condensed, as the reader 
 knows the main point upon which it turned. But the 
 latter will now see how it is impossible to give a correct 
 account of the letter which the Captain wrote to Major 
 Pendennis, as it was never opened at all by that gentle- 
 man. 
 
 When Miss Costigan came home from rehearsal, which 
 she did in the company of the faithful Mr. Bows, she 
 found her father pacing up and down .their apartment 
 in a great state of agitation, and in the midst of a pow- 
 erful odour of spirits and water, which, as it appeared, 
 had not succeeded in pacifying his disordered mind. 
 The Pendennis papers were on the table surrounding 
 the empty goblets and now useless teaspoon, which had 
 served to hold and mix the Captain's liquor and his 
 friend's. As Emily entered he seized her in his arms, 
 and cried out, " Prepare yourself, me child, me blessed 
 child," in a voice of agony, and with eyes brimful of 
 tears. 
 
 * Ye're tipsy again, Papa," Miss Fotheringay said, 
 pushing back her sire. ' Ye promised me ye wouldn't 
 take spirits before dinner."
 
 PENDENNIS 173 
 
 " It's to forget me sorrows, me poor girl, that I've 
 taken just a drop," cried the bereaved father " it's to 
 drown me care that I drain the bowl." 
 
 ' Your care takes a deal of drowning, Captain dear," 
 said Bows, mimicking his friend's accent; "what has 
 happened? Has that soft-spoken gentleman in the wig 
 been vexing you? " 
 
 "The oily miscreant! I'll have his blood!" roared 
 Cos. Miss Milly, it must be premised, had fled to her 
 room out of his embrace, and was taking off her bonnet 
 and shawl there. 
 
 " I thought he meant mischief. He was so uncom- 
 mon civil," the other said. ' What has he come to say? " 
 
 " O Bows! He has overwhellum'd me," the Captain 
 said. ' There's a hellish conspiracy on foot against me 
 poor girl; and it's me opinion that both them Penden- 
 nises, nephew and uncle, is two infernal thrators and 
 scoundthrels, who should be conshumed from off the 
 face of the earth." 
 
 " What is it? What has happened? " said Mr. Bows, 
 growing rather excited. 
 
 Costigan then told him the Major's statement that 
 the young Pendennis had not two thousand, nor two 
 hundred pounds a-year; and expressed his fury that 
 he should have permitted such an impostor to coax and 
 wheedle his innocent girl, and that he should have nour- 
 ished such a viper in his own personal bosom. " I have 
 shaken the reptile from me, however," said Costigan; 
 " and as for his uncle, I'll have such a revenge on that 
 old man, as shall make 'um rue the day he ever insulted 
 a Costigan." 
 
 ' What do you mean, General? " said Bows. 
 
 " I mean to have his life, Bows his villanous, skulk-
 
 174 PENDENNIS 
 
 ing life, my boy; " and he rapped upon the battered old 
 pistol-case in an ominous and savage manner. Bows 
 had often heard him appeal to that box of death, with 
 which he proposed to sacrifice his enemies ; but the Cap- 
 tain did not tell him that he had actually written and 
 sent a challenge to Major Pendennis, and Mr. Bows 
 therefore rather disregarded the pistols in the present 
 instance. 
 
 At this juncture Miss Fotheringay returned to the 
 common sitting-room from her private apartment, look- 
 ing perfectly healthy, happy, and unconcerned, a strik- 
 ing and wholesome contrast to her father, who was in a 
 delirious tremor of grief, anger, and other agitation. 
 She brought in a pair of ex-white satin shoes with her, 
 which she proposed to rub as clean as might be with 
 bread-crumb ; intending to go mad with them upon next 
 Tuesday evening in Ophelia, in which character she was 
 to reappear on that night. 
 
 She looked at the papers on the table; stopped as if 
 she was going to ask a question, but thought better of 
 it, and going to the cupboard, selected an eligible piece 
 of bread wherewith she might operate on the satin slip- 
 pers: and afterwards coming back to the table, seated 
 herself there commodiously with the shoes, and then 
 asked her father, in her honest Irish brogue, " What 
 have ye got them letthers, and pothry, and stuff, of 
 Master Arthur's out for, Pa? Sure ye don't want to be 
 reading over that nonsense." 
 
 " O Emilee! " cried the Captain, " that boy whom I 
 loved as the boy of mee bosom is only a scoundthrel, 
 and a deceiver, mee poor girl : " and he looked in the 
 most tragical way at Mr. Bows, opposite; who, in his 
 turn, gazed somewhat anxiously at Miss Costigan.
 
 PENDENNIS 175 
 
 " He ! pooh ! Sure the poor lad's as simple as a school- 
 boy," she said. " All them children write verses and 
 nonsense." 
 
 " He's been acting the part of a viper to this fireside, 
 and a traitor in this familee," cried the Captain. " I 
 tell ye he's no better than an impostor." 
 
 'What has the poor fellow done, Papa?" asked 
 Emily. 
 
 " Done? He has deceived us in the most athrocious 
 manner," Miss Emily's papa said. " He has thrifled 
 with your affections, and outraged my own fine feelings. 
 He has represented himself as a man of property, and 
 it turruns out that he is no betther than a beggar. 
 Haven't I often told ye he had two thousand a-year? 
 He's a pauper, I tell ye, Miss Costigan; a depindent 
 upon the bountee of his mother; a good woman, who 
 may marry again, who's likely to live for ever, and who 
 has but five hundred a-year. How dar he ask ye to 
 marry into a family which has not the means of provid- 
 ing for ye? Ye've been grossly deceived and put upon, 
 Milly, and it's my belief his old ruffian of an uncle in 
 a wig is in the plot against us." 
 
 " That soft old gentleman? What has he been doing, 
 Papa? " continued Emily, still imperturbable. 
 
 Costigan informed Milly that when she was gone, 
 Major Pendennis told him in his double-faced Pall 
 Mall polite manner, that young Arthur had no fortune 
 at all, that the Major had asked him (Costigan) to 
 go to the lawyers (" wherein he knew the scoundthrels 
 have a bill of mine, and I can't meet them," the 
 Captain parenthetically remarked), and see the lad's 
 father's will: and finally, that an infernal swindle had 
 been practised upon him by the pair, and that he was
 
 176 PENDENNIS 
 
 resolved either on a marriage, or on the blood of both 
 of them. 
 
 Milly looked very grave and thoughtful, rubbing the 
 white satin shoe. " Sure, if he's no money, there's no use 
 marrying him, Papa," she said sententiously. 
 
 " Why did the villain say he was a man of prawper- 
 tee? " asked Costigan. 
 
 ' The poor fellow always said he was poor," answered 
 the girl. 'Twas you who would have it he was rich, 
 Papa and made me agree to take him." 
 
 " He should have been explicit and told us his income, 
 Milly," answered the father. " A young fellow who 
 rides a blood mare, and makes presents of shawls and 
 bracelets, is an impostor if he has no money ; and as for 
 his uncle, bedad I'll pull off his wig whenever I see 'urn. 
 Bows, here, shall take a message to him and tell him so. 
 Either it's a marriage, or he meets me in the field like a 
 man, or I tweak 'um on the nose in front of his hotel or 
 in the gravel walks of Fairoaks Park before all the 
 county, bedad." 
 
 " Bedad, you may send somebody else with the mes- 
 sage," said Bows, laughing. " I'm a fiddler, not a fight- 
 ing man, Captain." 
 
 " Pooh, you've no spirit, sir," roared the General. 
 " I'll be my own second, if no one will stand by and see 
 me injured. And I'll take my case of pistols and shoot 
 'um in the Coffee Room of the George." 
 
 " And so poor Arthur has no money? " sighed out 
 Miss Costigan, rather plaintively. " Poor lad, he was 
 a good lad too: wild and talking nonsense, with his 
 verses and pothry and that, but a brave, generous boy, 
 and indeed I liked him and he liked me too," she added, 
 rather softly, and rubbing away at the shoe.
 
 PENDENNIS 177 
 
 ' Why don't you marry him if you like him so? " Mr. 
 Bows said, rather savagely. " He's not more than ten 
 years younger than you are. His mother may relent, 
 and you might go and live and have enough at Fairoaks 
 Park. Why not go and be a lady? I could go on with 
 the fiddle, and the General live on his half -pay. Why 
 don't you marry him? You know he likes you." 
 
 ' There's others that likes me as well, Bows, that has 
 no money and that's old enough," Miss Milly said sen- 
 tentiously. 
 
 " Yes, d it," said Bows, with a bitter curse 
 
 " that are old enough and poor enough and fools enough 
 for anything." 
 
 ' There's old fools, and young fools too. You've 
 often said so, you silly man," the imperious beauty said 
 with a conscious glance at the old gentleman. " If Pen- 
 dennis has not enough money to live upon, it's folly to 
 talk about marrying him : and that's the long and short 
 of it." 
 
 "And the boy?" said Mr. Bows. "By Jove! you 
 throw a man away like an old glove, Miss Costigan." 
 
 " I don't know what you mean, Bows," said Miss 
 Fotheringay, placidly, rubbing the second shoe. " If 
 he had had half of the two thousand a-year that Papa 
 gave him, or the half of that, I would marry him. But 
 what is the good of taking on with a beggar? We're 
 poor enough already. There's no use in my going to 
 live with an old lady that's testy and cross, maybe, and 
 would grudge me every morsel of meat. (Sure, it's 
 near dinner time, and Suky not laid the cloth yet. ) And 
 then," added Miss Costigan, quite simply, " suppose 
 there was a family? why, Papa, we shouldn't be as 
 well off as we are now."
 
 178 PENDENNIS 
 
 ' 'Deed then, you would not, Milly dear," answered 
 the father. 
 
 " And there's an end to all the fine talk about Mrs. 
 Arthur Pendennis of Fairoaks Park the member of 
 Parliament's lady," said Milly, with a laugh. " Pretty 
 carriages and horses we should have to ride! that you 
 were always talking about, Papa. But it's always the 
 same. If a man looked at me, you fancied he was going 
 to marry me; and if he had a good coat, you fancied 
 he was as rich as Crazes." 
 
 " As Croesus," said Mr. Bows. 
 
 ' Well, call 'um what ye like. But it's a fact now that 
 Papa has married me these eight years a score of times. 
 Wasn't I to be my Lady Poldoody of Oystherstown 
 Castle? Then there was the Navy Captain at Ports- 
 mouth, and the old surgeon at Norwich, and the Metho- 
 dist preacher here last year, and who knows how many 
 more? Well, I bet a penny, with all your scheming, 
 I shall die Milly Costigan at last. So poor little Arthur 
 has no money? Stop and take dinner, Bows: we've a 
 beautiful beef -steak pudding." 
 
 " I wonder whether she is on with Sir Derby Oaks," 
 thought Bows, whose eyes and thoughts were always 
 watching her. ' The dodges of women beat all com- 
 prehension; and I am sure she wouldn't let the lad off 
 so easily, if she had not some other scheme on hand." 
 
 It will have been perceived that Miss Fotheringay, 
 though silent in general, and by no means brilliant as 
 a conversationist where poetry, literature, or the fine arts 
 were concerned, could talk freely and with good sense, 
 too, in her own family circle. She cannot justly be called 
 a romantic person: nor were her literary acquirements 
 great : she never opened a Shakspeare from the day she
 
 PENDENNIS 179 
 
 left the stage, nor, indeed, understood it during all the 
 time she adorned the boards: but about a pudding, a 
 piece of needle-work, or her own domestic affairs, she 
 was as good a judge as could be found; and not being 
 misled by a strong imagination or a passionate temper, 
 was better enabled to keep her judgment cool. When, 
 over their dinner, Costigan tried to convince himself 
 and the company, that the Major's statement regarding 
 Pen's finances was unworthy of credit, and a mere ruse 
 upon the old hypocrite's part so as to induce them, on 
 their side, to break off the match, Miss Milly would not, 
 for a moment, admit the possibility of deceit on the side 
 of the adversary: and pointed out clearly that it was 
 her father who had deceived himself, and not poor little 
 Pen who had tried to take them in. As for that poor lad, 
 she said she pitied him with all her heart. And she ate 
 an exceedingly good dinner; to the admiration of Mr. 
 Bows, who had a remarkable regard and contempt for 
 this woman, during and after which repast the party 
 devised upon the best means of bringing this love-mat- 
 ter to a close. As for Costigan, his idea of tweaking 
 the Major's nose vanished with his supply of after- 
 dinner whisky-and-water ; and he was submissive to his 
 daughter, and ready for any plan on which she might 
 decide, in order to meet the crisis which she saw was at 
 hand. 
 
 The Captain, who, as long as he had a notion that he 
 was wronged, was eager to face and demolish both Pen 
 and his uncle, perhaps shrank from the idea of meeting 
 the former, and asked " what the juice they were to say 
 to the lad if he remained steady to his engagement, and 
 they broke from theirs? " ' What? don't you know how 
 to throw a man over? " said Bows; " ask a woman to
 
 180 PENDENNIS 
 
 tell you; " and Miss Fotheringay showed how this feat 
 was to be done simply enough nothing was more easy. 
 " Papa writes to Arthur to know what settlements he 
 proposes to make in event of a marriage ; and asks what 
 his means are. Arthur writes back and says what he's 
 got, and you'll find it's as the Major says, I'll go bail. 
 Then papa writes, and says it's not enough, and the 
 match had best be at an end." 
 
 " And, of course, you enclose a parting line, in which 
 you say you will always regard him as a brother," said 
 Mr. Bows, eyeing her in his scornful way. 
 
 " Of course, and so I shall," answered Miss Fother- 
 ingay. " He's a most worthy young man, I'm sure. 
 I'll thank ye hand me the salt. Them filberts is beau- 
 tiful." 
 
 " And there will be no noses pulled, Cos, my boy? 
 I'm sorry you're balked," said Mr. Bows. 
 
 ' 'Dad, I suppose not," said Cos, rubbing his own. 
 ' What '11 ye do about them letters, and verses, and 
 pomes, Milly, darling? Yc must send 'em back." 
 
 ' Wigsby would give a hundred pound for 'em," 
 Bows said, with a sneer. 
 
 ' 'Deed, then, he would," said Captain Costigan, who 
 was easily led. 
 
 " Papa! " said Miss Milly." Ye wouldn't be for not 
 sending the poor boy his letters back ? Them letters and 
 pomes is mine. They were very long, and full of all 
 sorts of nonsense, and Latin, and things I couldn't 
 understand the half of; indeed I've not read 'em all; 
 but we'll send 'em back to him when the proper time 
 comes." And going to a drawer, Miss Fotheringay 
 took out from it a number of the County Chronicle and 
 Chatteris Champion, in which Pen had written a copy
 
 PENDENNIS 181 
 
 of flaming verses celebrating her appearance in the char- 
 acter of Imogen, and putting by the leaf upon which 
 the poem appeared (for, like ladies of her profession, 
 she kept the favourable printed notices of her perform- 
 ances), she wrapped up Pen's letters, poems, passions, 
 and fancies, and tied them with a piece of string neatly, 
 as she would a parcel of sugar. 
 
 Nor was she in the least moved while performing this 
 act. What hours the boy had passed over those papers! 
 What love and longing : what generous faith and manly 
 devotion what watchful nights and lonely fevers might 
 they tell of ! She tied them up like so much grocery, and 
 sate down and made tea afterwards with a perfectly 
 placid and contented heart: while Pen was yearning 
 after her ten miles off: and hugging her image to his 
 soul.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 A CRISIS 
 
 AJOR PENDENNIS 
 
 came away from his in- 
 terview with Captain 
 Costigan in a state of 
 =: such concentrated fury 
 as rendered him terri- 
 ble to approach. * The 
 impudent bog-trotting 
 scamp," he thought, 
 ^ " dare to threaten me! 
 Dare to talk of permit- 
 =. ting his damned Costi- 
 _ gans to marry with the 
 Pendennises! Send me 
 a challenge 1 If the fel- 
 low can get anything in 
 the shape of a gentleman to carry it, I have the greatest 
 mind in life not to balk him. Psha! what would people 
 say if I were to go out with a tipsy mountebank, about 
 a row with an actress in a barn! " So when the Major 
 saw Dr. Portman, who asked anxiously regarding the 
 issue of his battle with the dragon, Mr. Pendennis did 
 not care to inform the divine of the General's insolent 
 behaviour, but stated that the affair was a very ugly 
 and disagreeable one, and that it was by no means over 
 yet. 
 
 182
 
 PENDENNIS 183 
 
 He enjoined Doctor and Mrs. Portman to say nothing 
 about the business at Fairoaks; and then he returned 
 to his hotel, where he vented his wrath upon Mr. Morgan 
 his valet, " dammin' and cussin' up stairs and down 
 stairs," as that gentleman observed to Mr. Foker's man, 
 in whose company he partook of dinner in the servants' 
 room of the George. 
 
 The servant carried the news to his master; and Mr. 
 Foker having finished his breakfast about this time, it 
 being two o'clock in the afternoon, remembered that he 
 was anxious to know the result of the interview between 
 his two friends, and having inquired the number of the 
 Major's sitting-room, went over in his brocade dressing- 
 gown, and knocked for admission. 
 
 The Major had some business, as he had stated, re- 
 specting a lease of the widow's, about which he was de- 
 sirous of consulting old Mr. Tatham, the lawyer, who 
 had been his brother's man of business, and who had a 
 branch-office at Clavering, where he and his son attended 
 market and other days three or four in the week. This 
 gentleman and his client were now in consultation when 
 Mr. Foker showed his grand dressing-gown and em- 
 broidered skull-cap at Major Pendennis's door. 
 
 Seeing the Major engaged with papers and red-tape, 
 and an old man with a white head, the modest youth was 
 for drawing back and said, " O, you're busy call 
 again another time." But Mr. Pendennis wanted to 
 see him, and begged him, with a smile, to enter: where- 
 upon Mr. Foker took off the embroidered tarboosh or 
 fez (it had been worked by the fondest of mothers) and 
 advanced, bowing to the gentlemen and smiling on them 
 graciously. Mr. Tatham had never seen so splendid an 
 apparition before as this brocaded youth, who seated
 
 184 PENDENNIS 
 
 himself in an arm-chair, spreading out his crimson skirts, 
 and looking with exceeding kindness and frankness on 
 the other two tenants of the room. ' You seem to like 
 my dressing-gown, sir," he said to Mr. Tatham. " A 
 pretty thing, isn't it? Neat, but not in the least gaudy. 
 And how do you do? Major Pendennis, sir, and how 
 does the world treat you? " 
 
 There was that in Foker's manner and appearance 
 which would have put an Inquisitor into good humour, 
 and it smoothed the wrinkles under Pendennis's head 
 of hair. 
 
 " I have had an interview with that Irishman, (you 
 may speak before my friend, Mr. Tatham here, who 
 knows all the affairs of the family,) and it has not, I 
 own, been very satisfactory. He won't believe that my 
 nephew is poor: he says we are both liars: he did me 
 the honour to hint that I was a coward, as I took leave. 
 And I thought when you knocked at the door, that you 
 might be the gentleman whom I expect with a challenge 
 from Mr. Costigan that is how the world treats me, 
 Mr. Foker." 
 
 * You don't mean that Irishman, the actress's 
 father?" cried Mr. Tatham, who was a dissenter him- 
 self, and did not patronise the drama. 
 
 ' That Irishman, the actress's father the very man. 
 Have not you heard what a fool my nephew has made 
 of himself about the girl? " and Major Pendennis had 
 to recount the story of his nephew's loves to the lawyer, 
 Mr. Foker coming in with appropriate comments in his 
 usual familiar language. 
 
 Tatham was lost in wonder at the narrative. Why 
 had not Mrs. Pendennis married a serious man, he 
 thought Mr. Tatham was a widower and kept this
 
 PENDENNIS 185 
 
 unfortunate boy from perdition? As for Miss Costigan, 
 he would say nothing: her profession was sufficient to 
 characterise her. Mr. Foker here interposed to say he 
 had known some uncommon good people in the booths, 
 as he called the Temple of the Muses. Well, it might 
 be so, Mr. Tatham hoped so but the father, Tatham 
 knew personally a man of the worst character, a wine- 
 bibber and an idler in taverns and billiard-rooms, and a 
 notorious insolvent. " I can understand the reason, Ma- 
 jor," he said, " why the fellow would not come to my 
 office to ascertain the truth of the statements which you 
 made him. We have a writ out against him and another 
 disreputable fellow, one of the play-actors, for a bill 
 given to Mr. Skinner of this city, a most respectable 
 Grocer and Wine and Spirit Merchant, and a Member 
 of the Society of Friends. This Costigan came crying 
 to Mr. Skinner, crying in the shop, sir, and we have 
 not proceeded against him or the other, as neither was 
 worth powder and shot." 
 
 It was whilst Mr. Tatham was engaged in telling his 
 story that a third knock came to the door, and there 
 entered an athletic gentleman in a shabby braided frock, 
 bearing in his hand a letter with a large blotched red 
 seal. 
 
 " Can I have the honour of speaking with Major Pen- 
 dennis in private? " he began " I have a few words for 
 your ear, sir. I am the bearer of a mission from my 
 friend Captain Costigan," but here the man with 
 the bass voice paused, faltered, and turned pale he 
 caught sight of the red and well-remembered face of 
 Mr. Tatham. 
 
 " Hullo, Garbetts, speak upl " cried Mr. Foker, de- 
 lighted.
 
 186 PENDENNIS 
 
 ' Why, bless my soul, it is the other party to the bill! " 
 said Mr. Tatham. ;< I say, sir; stop, I say." But Gar- 
 betts, with a face as blank as Macbeth 's when Banquo's 
 ghost appears upon him, gasped some inarticulate words, 
 and fled out of the room. 
 
 The Major's gravity was entirely upset, and he burst 
 out laughing. So did Mr. Foker, who said, " By Jove, 
 it was a good 'un." So did the attorney, although by 
 profession a serious man. 
 
 " I don't think there'll be any fight, Major," young 
 Foker said ; and began mimicking the tragedian. " If 
 there is, the old gentleman your name Tatham? very 
 happy to make your acquaintance, Mr. Tatham may 
 send the bailiffs to separate the men;" and Mr. Tatham 
 promised to do so. The Major was by no means 
 sorry at the ludicrous issue of the quarrel. " It seems 
 to me, sir," he said to Mr. Foker, " that you always 
 arrive to put me into good humour." 
 
 Nor was this the only occasion on which Mr. Foker 
 this day was destined to be of service to the Pendennis 
 family. We have said that he had the entree of Captain 
 Costigan's lodgings, and in the course of the afternoon 
 he thought he would pay the General a visit, and hear 
 from his own lips what had occurred in the conversation, 
 in the morning, with Mr. Pendennis. Captain Costigan 
 was not at home. He had received permission, nay, en- 
 couragement from his daughter, to go to the convivial 
 club at the Magpie Hotel, where no doubt he was brag- 
 ging at that moment of his desire to murder a certain 
 ruffian; for he was not only brave, but he knew it too, 
 and liked to take out his courage, and, as it were, give 
 it an airing in company. 
 
 Costigan then was absent, but Miss Fotheringay was
 
 PENDENNIS 187 
 
 at home washing the tea-cups whilst Mr. Bows sate op- 
 posite to her. 
 
 " Just done breakfast, I see how do? " said Mr. 
 Foker, popping in his little funny head. 
 
 " Get out, you funny little man," cried Miss Fother- 
 ingay. 
 
 ' You mean come in," answered the other. " Here 
 we are ! " and entering the room he folded his arms and 
 began twirling his head round and round with immense 
 rapidity, like Harlequin in the Pantomime when he first 
 issues from his cocoon or envelope. Miss Fotheringay 
 laughed with all her heart : a wink of Foker's would set 
 her off laughing, when the bitterest joke Bows ever 
 made could not get a smile from her, or the finest of 
 poor Pen's speeches would only puzzle her. At the end 
 of the harlequinade he sank down on one knee and kissed 
 her hand. 
 
 ' You're the drollest little man," she said, and gave 
 him a great good-humoured slap. Pen used to tremble 
 as he kissed her hand. Pen would have died of a slap. 
 
 These preliminaries over, the three began to talk; 
 Mr. Foker amused his companions by recounting to 
 them the scene which he had just witnessed of the dis- 
 comfiture of Mr. Garbetts, by which they learned, for 
 the first time, how far the General had carried his wrath 
 against Major Pendennis. Foker spoke strongly in 
 favour of the Major's character for veracity and honour, 
 and described him as a tip-top swell, moving in the upper 
 circle of society, who would never submit to any deceit 
 much more to deceive such a charming young woman 
 as Miss Foth. 
 
 He touched delicately upon the delicate marriage 
 question, though he couldn't help showing that he held
 
 188 PENDENNIS 
 
 Pen rather cheap. In fact, he had a perhaps just con- 
 tempt for Mr. Pen's high-flown sentimentality ; his own 
 weakness, as he thought, not lying that way. " I knew 
 it wouldn't do, Miss Foth," said he, nodding his little 
 head. " Couldn't do. Didn't like to put my hand into 
 the bag, but knew it couldn't do. He's too young for 
 you: too green: a deal too green: and he turns out 
 to be poor as Job. Can't have him at no price, can she, 
 Mr. Bo?" 
 
 " Indeed he's a nice poor boy," said the Fotheringay 
 rather sadly. 
 
 " Poor little beggar," said Bows, with his hands in 
 his pockets, and stealing up a queer look at Miss Fother- 
 ingay. Perhaps he thought and wondered at the way 
 in which women play with men, and coax them and win 
 them and drop them. 
 
 But Mr. Bows had not the least objection to acknow- 
 ledge that he thought Miss Fotheringay was perfectly 
 right in giving up Mr. Arthur Pendennis, and that in 
 his idea the match was always an absurd one : and Miss 
 Costigan owned that she thought so herself, only she 
 couldn't send away two thousand a-year. " It all comes 
 of believing Papa's silly stories," she said; " faith, I'll 
 choose for meself another time " and very likely the 
 large image of Lieutenant Sir Derby Oaks entered into 
 her mind at that instant. 
 
 After praising Major Pendennis, whom Miss Costi- 
 gan declared to be a proper gentleman entirely, smell- 
 ing of lavender, and as neat as a pin, and who was 
 pronounced by Mr. Bows to be the right sort of fellow, 
 though rather too much of an old buck, Mr. Foker sud- 
 denly bethought him to ask the pair to come and meet 
 the Major that very evening at dinner at his apartment
 
 PENDENNIS 189 
 
 at the George. " He agreed to dine with me, and I 
 think after the after the little shindy this morning, in 
 which I must say the General was wrong, it would look 
 kind, you know. I know the Major fell in love with 
 you, Miss Foth : he said so." 
 
 " So she may be Mrs. Pendennis still," Bows said with 
 a sneer" No, thank you, Mr. F. I've dined." 
 
 " Sure, that was at three o'clock," said Miss Costigan, 
 who had an honest appetite, " and I can't go without 
 
 you." 
 
 " We'll have lobster-salad and Champagne," said the 
 little monster, who could not construe a line of Latin, or 
 do a sum beyond the Rule of Three. Now, for lobster- 
 salad and Champagne in an honourable manner, Miss 
 Costigan would have gone anywhere and Major Pen- 
 dennis actually found himself at seven o'clock, seated at 
 a dinner-table in company with Mr. Bows, a profes- 
 sional fiddler, and Miss Costigan, whose father had 
 wanted to blow his brains out a few hours before. 
 
 To make the happy meeting complete, Mr. Foker, 
 who knew Costigan's haunts, despatched Stoopid to the 
 club at the Magpie, where the General was in the act 
 of singing a pathetic song, and brought him off to 
 supper. To find his daughter and Bows seated at the 
 board was a surprise indeed Major Pendennis laughed, 
 and cordially held out his hand, which the General Offi- 
 cer grasped avec effusion as the French say. In fact 
 he was considerably inebriated, and had already been 
 crying over his. own song before he joined the little party 
 at the George. He burst into tears more than once, 
 during the entertainment, and called the Major his 
 dearest friend. Stoopid and Mr. Foker walked home 
 with him: the Major gallantly giving his arm to Miss
 
 190 PENDENNIS 
 
 Costigan. He was received with great friendliness 
 when he called the next day, when many civilities passed 
 between the gentlemen. On taking leave he expressed 
 his anxious desire to serve Miss Costigan on any occa- 
 sion in which he could be useful to her, and he shook 
 hands with Mr. Foker most cordially and gratefully, 
 and said that gentleman had done him the very greatest 
 service. 
 
 " All right," said Mr. Foker : and they parted with 
 mutual esteem. 
 
 On his return to Fairoaks the next day, Major Pen- 
 dennis did not say what had happened to him on the 
 previous night, or allude to the company in which he had 
 passed it. But he engaged Mr. Smirke to stop to din- 
 ner; and any person accustomed to watch his manner 
 might have remarked that there was something con- 
 strained in his hilarity and talkativeness, and that he was 
 unusually gracious and watchful in his communications 
 with his nephew. He gave Pen an emphatic God-bless- 
 you when the lad went to bed; and as they were about 
 to part for the night, he seemed as if he were going to 
 say something to Mrs. Pendennis, but he bethought him 
 that if he spoke he might spoil her night's rest, and 
 allowed her to sleep in peace. 
 
 The next morning he was down in the breakfast-room 
 earlier than was his custom, and saluted everybody there 
 with great cordiality. The post used to arrive commonly 
 about the end of this meal. When John, the old servant, 
 entered, and discharged the bag of its letters and papers, 
 the Major looked hard at Pen as the lad got his Ar- 
 thur blushed, and put his letter down. He knew the 
 hand, it was that of old Costigan, and he did not care 
 to read it in public. Major Pendennis knew the letter,
 
 PENDENNIS 191 
 
 too. He had put it into the post himself in Chatteris 
 the day before. 
 
 He told little Laura to go away, which the child did, 
 having a thorough dislike to him ; and as the door closed 
 on her, he took Mrs. Pendennis's hand, and giving her 
 a look full of meaning, pointed to the letter under the 
 newspaper which Pen was pretending to read. '* Will 
 you come into the drawing-room? " he said. " I want 
 to speak to you." 
 
 And she followed him, wondering, into the hall. 
 
 ' What is it? " she said nervously. 
 
 ' The affair is at an end," Major Pendennis said. 
 " He has a letter there giving him his dismissal. I dic- 
 tated it myself yesterday. There are a few lines from 
 the lady, too, bidding him farewell. It is all over." 
 
 Helen ran back to the dining-room, her brother fol- 
 lowing. Pen had jumped at his letter the instant they 
 were gone. He was reading it with a stupefied face. It 
 stated what the Major had said, that Mr. Costigan was 
 most gratified for the kindness with which Arthur had 
 treated his daughter, but that he was only now made 
 aware of Mr. Pendennis's pecuniary circumstances. 
 They were such that marriage was at present out of the 
 question, and considering the great disparity in the age 
 of the two, a future union was impossible. Under these 
 circumstances, and with the deepest regret and esteem 
 for him, Mr. Costigan bade Arthur farewell, and sug- 
 gested that he should cease visiting, for some time at 
 least, at his house. 
 
 A few lines from Miss Costigan were inclosed. She 
 acquiesced in the decision of her Papa. She pointed out 
 that she was many years older than Arthur, and that an 
 engagement was not to be thought of. She would al-
 
 192 PENDENNIS 
 
 ways be grateful for his kindness to her, and hoped to 
 keep his friendship. But at present, and until the pain 
 of the separation should be over, she entreated they 
 should not meet. -= 
 
 Pen read Costigan's letter and its inclosure mechani- 
 cally, hardly knowing what was before his eyes. He 
 looked up wildly, and saw his mother and uncle regard- 
 ing him with sad faces. Helen's, indeed, was full of 
 tender maternal anxiety. 
 
 ' What what is this? " Pen said. " It's some joke. 
 This is not her writing. This is some servant's writing. 
 Who's playing these tricks upon me? " 
 
 " It comes under her father's envelope," the Major 
 said. ' Those letters you had before were not in her 
 hand: that is hers." 
 
 " How do you know? " said Pen very fiercely. 
 
 " I saw her write it," the uncle answered, as the boy 
 started up; and his mother, coming forward, took his 
 hand. He put her away. 
 
 " How came you to see her? How came you between 
 me and her? What have I ever done to you that you 
 should Oh, it's not true; it's not true! " Pen broke out 
 with a wild execration. " She can't have done it of her 
 own accord. She can't mean it. She's pledged to me. 
 Who has told her lies to break her from me? " 
 
 " Lies are not told in the family, Arthur," Major Pen- 
 dennis replied. ; ' I told her the truth, which was, that 
 you had no money to maintain her, for her foolish father 
 had represented you to be rich. And when she knew 
 how poor you were, she withdrew at once, and without 
 any persuasion of mine. She was quite right. She is 
 ten years older than you are. She is perfectly unfitted 
 to be your wife, and knows it. Look at that hand-writ-
 
 PENDENNIS 193 
 
 ing, and ask yourself, is such a woman fitted to be the 
 companion of your mother? " 
 
 " I will know from herself if it is true," Arthur said, 
 crumpling up the paper. 
 
 ' Won't you take my word of honour? Her letters 
 were written by a confidante of hers, who writes better 
 than she can look here. Here's one from the lady to 
 your friend, Mr. Foker. You have seen her with Miss 
 Costigan, as whose amanuensis she acted " the Major 
 said, with ever so little of a sneer, and laid down a cer- 
 tain billet which Mr. Foker had given to him. 
 
 " It's not that," said Pen, burning with shame and 
 rage. " I suppose what you say is true, sir, but I'll 
 hear it from herself." 
 
 " Arthur! " appealed his mother. 
 
 " I will see her," said Arthur. " I'll ask her to marry 
 me, once more. I will. No one shall prevent me." 
 
 ' What, a woman who spells affection with one f ? 
 Nonsense, sir. Be a man, and remember that your 
 mother is a lady. She was never made to associate with 
 that tipsy old swindler or his daughter. Be a man and 
 forget her, as she does you." 
 
 " Be a man and comfort your mother, my Arthur," 
 Helen said, going and embracing him: and seeing that 
 the pair were greatly moved, Major Pendennis went out 
 of the room and shut the door upon them, wisely judging 
 that they were best alone. 
 
 He had won a complete victory. He actually had 
 brought away Pen's letters in his portmanteau from 
 Chatteris: having complimented Mr. Costigan, when 
 he returned them, by giving him the little promissory 
 note which had disquieted himself and Mr. Garbetts: 
 and for which the Major settled with Mr. Tatham.
 
 194 PENDENNIS 
 
 Pen rushed wildly off to Chatteris that day, but in 
 vain attempted to see Miss Fotheringay, for whom he 
 left a letter, inclosed to her father. The inclosure was 
 returned by Mr. Costigan, who begged that all corre- 
 spondence might end ; and after one or two further at- 
 tempts of the lad's, the indignant General desired that 
 their acquaintance might cease. He cut Pen in the 
 street. As Arthur and Foker were pacing the Castle 
 walk, one day, they came upon Emily on her father's 
 arm. She passed without any nod of recognition. Fo- 
 ker felt poor Pen trembling on his arm. 
 
 His uncle wanted him to travel, to quit the country 
 for a while, and his mother urged him too: for he was 
 growing very ill, and suffered severely. But he refused, 
 and said point-blank he would not go. He would not 
 obey in this instance : and his mother was too fond, and 
 his uncle too wise to force him. Whenever Miss Foth- 
 eringay acted, he rode over to the Chatteris Theatre and 
 saw her. One night there were so few people in the 
 house that the Manager returned the money. Pen came 
 home and went to bed at eight o'clock and had a fever. 
 If this continues, his mother will be going over and fetch- 
 ing the girl, the Major thought, in despair. As for 
 Pen, he thought he should die. We are not going to 
 describe his feelings, or give a dreary journal of his 
 despair and passion. Have not other gentlemen been 
 balked in love besides Mr. Pen? Yes, indeed: but few 
 die of the malady.
 
 A cut direct
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 IN WHICH MISS FOTHERINGAY MAKES A NEW 
 ENGAGEMENT 
 
 ITHIN a short period 
 of the events above 
 narrated, Mr. Manager 
 Bingley was perform- 
 ing his famous charac- 
 ter of Rolla, in "Pi- 
 zarro," to a house so 
 exceedingly thin, that it 
 would appear as if the 
 part of Rolla was by no 
 means such a favourite 
 with the people of Chat- 
 teris as it was with the 
 accomplished actor him- 
 self. Scarce anybody 
 was in the theatre. Poor 
 Pen had the boxes al- 
 most all to himself, and sate there lonely, with blood- 
 shot eyes, leaning over the ledge, and gazing haggardly 
 towards the scene, when Cora came in. When she was 
 not on the stage he saw nothing. Spaniards and Peru- 
 vians, processions and battles, priests and virgins of the 
 sun, went in and out, and had their talk, but Arthur 
 took no note of any one of them; and only saw Cora 
 whom his soul longed after. He said afterwards that he 
 
 195
 
 190 PENDENNIS 
 
 wondered he had not taken a pistol to shoot her, so mad 
 was he with love, and rage, and despair ; and had it not 
 been for his mother at home, to whom he did not speak 
 about his luckless condition, but whose silent sympathy 
 and watchfulness greatly comforted the simple half 
 heart-broken fellow, who knows but he might have done 
 something desperate, and have ended his days prema- 
 turely in front of Chatteris gaol? There he sate then, 
 miserable, and gazing at her. And she took no more 
 notice of him than he did of the rest of the house. 
 
 The Fotheringay was uncommonly handsome, in a 
 white raiment and leopard skin, with a sun upon her 
 breast, and fine tawdry bracelets on her beautiful glanc- 
 ing arms. She spouted to admiration the few words of 
 her part, and looked it still better. The eyes, which had 
 overthrown Pen's soul, rolled and gleamed as lustrous 
 as ever; but it was not to him that they were directed 
 that night. He did not know to whom, or remark a 
 couple of gentlemen, in the box next to him, upon whom 
 Miss Fotheringay's glances were perpetually shining. 
 
 Nor had Pen noticed the extraordinary change which 
 had taken place on the stage a short time after the entry 
 of these two gentlemen into the theatre. There were so 
 few people in the house, that the first act of the play 
 languished entirely, and there had been some question 
 of returning the money, as upon that other unfortunate 
 night when poor Pen had been driven away. The actors 
 were perfectly careless about their parts, and yawned 
 through the dialogue, and talked loud to each other 
 in the intervals. Even Bingley was listless, and Mrs. 
 B. in Elvira spoke under her breath. 
 
 How came it that all of a sudden Mrs. Bingley began 
 to raise her voice and bellow like a bull of Bashan?
 
 PENDENNIS 197 
 
 Whence was it that Bingley, flinging off his apathy, 
 darted about the stage and yelled like Kean? Why did 
 Garbetts and Rowkins and Miss Rouncy try, each of 
 them, the force of their charms or graces, and act and 
 swagger and scowl and spout their very loudest at the 
 two gentlemen in box No. 3? 
 
 One was a quiet little man in black, with a grey head 
 and a jolly shrewd face the other was in all respects a 
 splendid and remarkable individual. He was a tall and 
 portly gentleman with a hooked nose and a profusion of 
 curling brown hair and whiskers; his coat was covered 
 with the richest frogs, braiding, and velvet. He had 
 under- waistcoats, many splendid rings, jewelled pins 
 and neck-chains. When he took out his yellow pocket- 
 handkerchief with his hand that was cased in white kids, 
 a delightful odour of musk and bergamot was shaken 
 through the house. He was evidently a personage of 
 rank, and it was at him that the little Chatteris company 
 was acting. 
 
 He was, in a word, no other than Mr. Dolphin, the 
 great manager from London, accompanied by his faith- 
 ful friend and secretary Mr. William Minns: without 
 whom he never travelled. He had not been ten minutes 
 in the theatre before his august presence there was per- 
 ceived by Bingley and the rest: and they all began to 
 act their best and try to engage his attention. Even 
 Miss Fotheringay's dull heart, which was disturbed at 
 nothing, felt perhaps a flutter, when she came in presence 
 of the famous London Impresario. She had not much 
 to do in her part, but to look handsome, and stand in pic- 
 turesque attitudes encircling her child : and she did this 
 work to admiration. In vain the various actors tried to 
 win the favour of the great stage Sultan. Pizarro never
 
 198 PENDENNIS 
 
 got a hand from him. Bingley yelled, and Mrs. Bing- 
 ley bellowed, and the Manager only took snuff out of 
 his great gold box. It was only in the last scene, when 
 Holla comes in staggering with the infant (Bingley is 
 not so strong as he was, and his fourth son Master Talma 
 Bingley is a monstrous large child for his age) when 
 Holla comes staggering with the child to Cora, who 
 rushes forward with a shriek and says "O God, there's 
 blood upon him! " that the London manager clapped 
 his hands, and broke out with an enthusiastic bravo. 
 
 Then having concluded his applause, Mr. Dolphin 
 gave his secretary a slap on the shoulder, and said " By 
 Jove, Billy, she'll do!" 
 
 ' Who taught her that dodge? " said old Billy, who 
 was a sardonic old gentleman " I remember her at the 
 Olympic, and hang me if she could say Bo to a goose." 
 
 It was little Mr. Bows in the orchestra who had taught 
 her the " dodge " in question. All the company heard 
 the applause, and, as the curtain went down, came round 
 her and congratulated and hated Miss. Fotheringay. 
 
 Now Mr. Dolphin's appearance in the remote little 
 Chatteris theatre may be accounted for in this manner. 
 In spite of all his exertions, and the perpetual blazes of 
 triumph, coruscations of talent, victories of good old 
 English comedy, which his play-bills advertised, his 
 theatre (which, if you please, and to injure no present 
 susceptibilities and vested interests, we shall call the 
 Museum Theatre) by no means prospered, and the fa- 
 mous Impresario found himself on the verge of ruin. 
 The great Hubbard had acted legitimate drama for 
 twenty nights, and failed to remunerate anybody but 
 himself: the celebrated Mr. and Mrs. Cawdor had come 
 out in Mr. Rawhead's tragedy, and in their favourite
 
 The Manager from London
 
 PENDENNIS 199 
 
 round of pieces, and had not attracted the public. Herr 
 Garbage's lions and tigers had drawn for a little time, 
 until one of the animals had bitten a piece out of the 
 Heir's shoulder; when the Lord Chamberlain inter- 
 fered, and put a stop to this species of performance: 
 and the grand Lyrical Drama, though brought out with 
 unexampled splendour and success, with Monsieur 
 Poumons as first tenor, and an enormous orchestra, had 
 almost crushed poor Dolphin in its triumphant progress : 
 so that great as his genius and resources were, they 
 seemed to be at an end. He was dragging on his season 
 wretchedly with half salaries, small operas, feeble old 
 comedies, and his ballet company; and everybody was 
 looking out for the day when he should appear in the 
 Gazette. 
 
 One of the illustrious patrons of the Museum Theatre, 
 and occupant of the great proscenium-box, was a gen- 
 tleman whose name has been mentioned in a previous 
 history ; that refined patron of the arts, and enlightened 
 lover of music and the drama, the Most Noble the Mar- 
 quis of Steyne. His lordship's avocations as a states- 
 man prevented him from attending the playhouse very 
 often, or coming very early. But he occasionally ap- 
 peared at the theatre in time for the ballet, and was 
 always received with the greatest respect by the Man- 
 ager, from whom he sometimes condescended to receive 
 a visit in his box. It communicated with the stage, and 
 when anything occurred there which particularly pleased 
 him, when a new face made its appearance among the 
 coryphees, or a fair dancer executed a pas with especial 
 grace or agility, Mr. Wenham, Mr. Wagg, or some 
 other aide-de-camp of the noble Marquis, would be com- 
 missioned to go behind the scenes, and express the great
 
 200 PENDENNIS 
 
 man's approbation, or make the inquiries which were 
 prompted by his lordship's curiosity, or his interest in 
 the dramatic art. He could not be seen by the audience, 
 for Lord Steyne sate modestly behind a curtain, and 
 looked only towards the stage but you could know he 
 was in the house, by the glances which all the corps-de- 
 ballet, and all the principal dancers, cast towards his 
 box. I have seen many scores of pairs of eyes ( as in the 
 Palm Dance in the ballet of Cook at Otaheite, where 
 no less than a hundred-and-twenty lovely female sav- 
 ages in palm leaves and feather aprons, were made to 
 dance round Floridar as Captain Cook), ogling that 
 box as they performed before it, and have often won- 
 dered to remark the presence of mind of Mademoiselle 
 Sauterelle, or Mademoiselle de Bondi (known as la 
 petite Caoutchouc), who, when actually up in the air 
 quivering like so many shuttlecocks, always kept their 
 lovely eyes winking at that box in which the great Steyne 
 sate. Now and then you would hear a harsh voice from 
 behind the curtain, cry, " Brava, Brava," or a pair of 
 white gloves wave from it, and begin to applaud. 
 Bondi, or Sauterelle, when they came down to earth, 
 curtsied and smiled, especially to those hands, before 
 they walked up the stage again, panting and happy. 
 
 One night this great Prince surrounded by a few 
 choice friends was in his box at the Museum, and they 
 were making such a noise and laughter that the pit was 
 scandalised, and many indignant voices were bawling out 
 silence so loudly, that Wagg wondered the police did 
 not interfere to take the rascals out. Wenham was 
 amusing the party in the box with extracts from a pri- 
 vate letter which he had received from Major Penden- 
 nis, whose absence in the country at the full London
 
 PENDENNIS 201 
 
 season had been remarked, and of course deplored by 
 his friends. 
 
 ' The secret is out," said Mr. Wenham, " there's a 
 woman in the case." 
 
 ' Why, d - it, Wenham, he's your age," said the 
 gentleman behind the curtain. 
 
 " Pour les ames bien nees, 1'amour ne compte pas le 
 nombre des annees," said Mr. Wenham, with a gallant 
 air. " For my part, I hope to be a victim till I die, and 
 to break my heart every year of my life." The mean- 
 ing of which sentence was, " My lord, you need not talk; 
 I'm three years younger than you, and twice as well 
 
 conserve" 
 
 ' Wenham, you affect me," said the great man, with 
 one of his usual oaths. " By - you do. I like to see 
 a fellow preserving all the illusions of youth up to our 
 time of life and keeping his heart warm as yours is. 
 Hang it, sir, it's a comfort to meet with such a gener- 
 ous, candid creature. Who's that gal in the second row, 
 with blue ribbons, third from the stage fine gal. Yes, 
 you and I are sentimentalists. Wagg I don't think so 
 much cares it's the stomach rather more than the heart 
 with you, eh, Wagg, my boy? " 
 
 " I like everything that's good," said Mr. Wagg, gen- 
 erously. " Beauty and Burgundy, Venus and Venison. 
 I don't say that Venus's turtles are to be despised, be- 
 cause they don't cook them at the London Tavern: but 
 but tell us about old Pendennis, Mr. Wenham," he 
 abruptly concluded for his joke flagged just then, as 
 he saw that his patron was not listening. In fact, 
 Steyne's glasses were up, and he was examining some 
 object on the stage. 
 
 " Yes, I've heard that joke about Venus's turtle and
 
 202 PEXDEXNIS 
 
 the London Tavern before you begin to fail, my poor 
 Wagg. If you don't mind I shall be obliged to have 
 a new Jester," Lord Steyne said, laying down his glass. 
 " Go on, Wenham, about old Pendennis." 
 
 " Dear Wenham, he begins," Mr. Wenham read, 
 " as you have had my character in your hands for the 
 last three weeks, and no doubt have torn me to shreds, 
 according to your custom, I think you can afford to be 
 good-humoured by way of variety, and to do me a ser- 
 vice. It is a delicate matter, entre nous, une affaire de 
 cceur. There is a young friend of mine who is gone wild 
 about a certain Miss Fotheringay, an actress at the the- 
 atre here, and I must own to you, as handsome a woman, 
 and, as it appears to me, as good an actress as ever put 
 on rouge. She does Ophelia, Lady Teazle, Mrs. Haller 
 that sort of thing. Upon my word, she is as splendid 
 as Georges in her best days, and, as far as I know, ut- 
 terly superior to anything we have on our scene. J want 
 a London engagement for her. Can't you get your 
 friend Dolphin to come and see her to engage her to 
 take her out of this place? A word from a noble friend 
 of ours (you understand) would be invaluable, and if 
 you could get the Gaunt House interest for me I will 
 promise anything I can in return for your service 
 which I shall consider one of the greatest that can be 
 done to me. Do, do this now as a good fellow, which I 
 always said you were: and in return, command yours 
 truly, A. PENDENNIS." 
 
 ' It's a clear case," said Mr. Wenham, having read 
 this letter; " old Pendennis is in love." 
 
 " And wants to get the woman up to London evi- 
 dently," continued Mr. Wagg.
 
 PENDENNIS 203 
 
 " I should like to see Pendennis on his knees, with the 
 rheumatism," said Mr. Wenham. 
 
 " Or accommodating the beloved object with a lock of 
 his hair," said Wagg. 
 
 " Stuff," said the great man. " He has relations in
 
 204 PENDENNIS 
 
 the county, hasn't he? He said something about a 
 nephew, whose interest could return a member. It is 
 the nephew's affair, depend on it. The young one is in 
 a scrape. I was myself when I was in the fifth form 
 at Eton a market-gardener's daughter and swore I'd 
 marry her. I was mad about her poor Polly! " Here 
 he made a pause, and perhaps the past rose up to Lord 
 Steyne, and George Gaunt was a boy again not alto- 
 gether lost. " But I say, she must be a fine woman from 
 Pendennis's account. Have in Dolphin, and let us hear 
 if he knows anything of her." 
 
 At this Wenham sprang out of the box, passed the 
 servitor who waited at the door communicating with the 
 stage, and who saluted Mr. Wenham with profound re- 
 spect; and the latter emissary, pushing on and familiar 
 with the place, had no difficulty in finding out the 
 manager, who was employed, as he not unfrequently 
 was, in swearing and cursing the ladies of the corps-de- 
 ballet for not doing their duty. 
 
 The oaths died away on Mr. Dolphin's lips, as soon 
 as he saw Mr. Wenham; and he drew off the hand 
 which was clenched in the face of one of the offending 
 Coryphees, to grasp that of the new comer. " How do, 
 Mr. Wenham? How's his lordship to-night? Looks 
 uncommonly well," said the manager smiling, as if he 
 had never been out of temper in his life; and he was 
 only too delighted to follow Lord Steyne's ambassador, 
 and pay his personal respects to that great man. 
 
 The visit to Chatteris was the result of their conver- 
 sation: and Mr. Dolphin wrote to his Lordship from 
 that place, and did himself the honour to inform the 
 Marquis of Steyne, that he had seen the lady about whom 
 his Lordship had spoken, that he was as much struck
 
 PENDENNIS 205 
 
 by her talents as he was by her personal appearance, and 
 that he had made an engagement with Miss Fotherin- 
 gay, who would soon have the honour of appearing be- 
 fore a London audience, and his noble and enlightened 
 patron the Marquis of Steyne. 
 
 Pen read the announcement of Miss Fotheringay's 
 engagement in the Chatteris paper, where he had so 
 often praised her charms. The Editor made very hand- 
 some mention of her talent and beauty, and prophesied 
 her success in the metropolis. Bingley, the manager, 
 began to advertise " The last night of Miss Fotherin- 
 gay's engagement." Poor Pen and Sir Derby Oaks 
 were very constant at the play : Sir Derby in the stage- 
 box, throwing bouquets and getting glances. Pen in 
 the almost deserted boxes, haggard, wretched, and 
 lonely. Nobody cared whether Miss Fotheringay was 
 going or staying except those two and perhaps one 
 more, which was Mr. Bows of the orchestra. 
 
 He came out of his place one night, and went into the 
 house to the box where Pen was; and he held out his 
 hand to him, and asked him to come and walk. They 
 walked down the street together; and went and sate 
 upon Chatteris bridge in the moonlight, and talked about 
 Her. ' We may sit on the same bridge," said he: " we 
 have been in the same boat for a long time. You are 
 not the only man who has made a fool of himself about 
 that woman. And I have less excuse than you, because 
 I'm older and know her better. She has no more heart 
 than the stone you are leaning on; and it or you or I 
 might fall into the water, and never come up again, 
 and she wouldn't care. Yes she would care for me, 
 because she wants me to teach her: and she won't be 
 able to get on without me, and will be forced to send for
 
 206 PENDENNIS 
 
 me from London. But she wouldn't if she didn't want 
 me. She has no heart and no head, and no sense, and 
 no feelings, and no griefs or cares, whatever. I was 
 going to say no pleasures but the fact is, she does like 
 her dinner, and she is pleased when people admire her." 
 
 " And you do? " said Pen, interested out of himself, 
 and wondering at the crabbed homely little old man. 
 
 " It's a habit, like taking snuff, or drinking drams," 
 said the other, " I've been taking her these five years, 
 and can't do without her. It was I made her. If she 
 doesn't send for me, I shall follow her : but I know she'll 
 send for me. She wants me. Some day she'll marry, 
 and fling me over, as I do the end of this cigar." 
 
 The little flaming spark dropped into the water be- 
 low, and disappeared; and Pen, as he rode home that 
 night, actually thought about somebody but himself.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE HAPPY VILLAGE 
 
 _ NTIL the enemy had retired 
 fc J altogether from before the 
 place, Major Pendennis was 
 resolved to keep his garrison 
 in Fairoaks. He did not ap- 
 pear to watch Pen's behaviour, 
 or to put any restraint on his 
 nephew's actions, but he man- 
 aged, nevertheless, to keep the 
 lad constantly under his eye or 
 those of his agents, and young 
 Arthur's comings and goings 
 were quite well known to his 
 vigilant guardian. 
 I suppose there is scarcely any man who reads this 
 or any other novel but has been balked in love sometime 
 or the other, by fate, and circumstance, by falsehood of 
 women, or his own fault. Let that worthy friend recall 
 his own sensations under the circumstances, and apply 
 them as illustrative of Mr. Pen's anguish. Ah! what 
 weary nights and sickening fevers! Ah! what mad de- 
 sires dashing up against some rock of obstruction or in- 
 difference, and flung back again from the unimpres- 
 sionable granite! If a list could be made this very night 
 in London of the groans, thoughts, imprecations of toss- 
 ing lovers, what a catalogue it would be! I wonder what 
 
 907
 
 208 PENDENNIS 
 
 a percentage of the male population of the metropolis 
 will be lying awake at two or three o'clock to-morrow 
 morning, counting the hours as they go by, knelling 
 drearily, and rolling from left to right, restless, yearn- 
 ing, and heart-sick? What a pang it is! I never knew 
 a man die of love, certainly, but I have known a twelve 
 stone man go down to nine stone five under a disap- 
 pointed passion, so that pretty nearly a quarter of him 
 may be said to have perished : and that is no small por- 
 tion. He has come back to his old size subsequently 
 perhaps is bigger than ever: very likely some new af- 
 fection has closed round his heart and ribs and made 
 them comfortable, and young Pen is a man who will 
 console himself like the rest of us. We say this lest the 
 ladies should be disposed to deplore him prematurely, or 
 be seriously uneasy with regard to his complaint. His 
 mother was, but what will not a maternal fondness fear 
 or invent? " Depend on it, my dear creature," Major 
 Pendennis would say gallantly to her, " the boy will re- 
 cover. As soon as we get her out of the country, we will 
 take him somewhere, and show him a little life. Mean- 
 time make yourself easy about him. Half a fellow's 
 pangs at losing a woman result from vanity more than 
 affection. To be left by a woman is the deuce and all, 
 to be sure; but look how easily we leave 'em." 
 
 Mrs. Pendennis did not know. This sort of know- 
 ledge had by no means come within the simple lady's 
 scope. Indeed, she did not like the subject or to talk 
 of it : her heart had had its own little private misadven- 
 ture, and she had borne up against it, and cured it : and 
 perhaps she had not much patience with other folks' pas- 
 sions, except, of course, Arthur's, whose sufferings she 
 made her own, feeling indeed very likely, in many of the
 
 PENDENNIS 209 
 
 boy's illnesses and pains, a great deal more than Pen 
 himself endured. And she watched him through this 
 present grief with a jealous silent sympathy; although, 
 as we have said, he did not talk to her of his unfortunate 
 condition. 
 
 The Major must be allowed to have had not a little 
 merit and forbearance, and to have exhibited a highly 
 creditable degree of family affection. The life at Fair- 
 oaks was uncommonly dull to a man who had the entree 
 of half the houses in London, and was in the habit of 
 making his bow in three or four drawing-rooms of a 
 night. A dinner with Doctor Portman or a neighbouring 
 Squire now and then ; a dreary rubber at backgammon 
 with the widow, who did her utmost to amuse him ; these 
 were the chief of his pleasures. He used to long for the 
 arrival of the bag with the letters, and he read every 
 word of the evening paper. He doctored himself too, 
 assiduously, a course of quiet living would suit him 
 well, he thought, after the London banquets. He 
 dressed himself laboriously every morning and after- 
 noon: he took regular exercise up and down the terrace 
 walk. Thus, with his cane, his toilet, his medicine-chest, 
 his backgammon-box, and his newspaper, this worthy 
 and worldly philosopher fenced himself against ennui; 
 and if he did not improve each shining hour, like the bees 
 by the widow's garden wall, Major Pendennis made one 
 hour after another pass as he could; and rendered his 
 captivity just tolerable. 
 
 Pen sometimes took the box at backgammon of a 
 night, or would listen to his mother's simple music of 
 summer evenings but he was very restless and wretched 
 in spite of all : and has been known to be up before the 
 early daylight even: and down at a carp-pond in Clav-
 
 210 PENDENNIS 
 
 ering Park, a dreary pool with innumerable whispering 
 rushes and green alders, where a milkmaid drowned her- 
 self in the Baronet's grandfather's time, and her ghost 
 was said to walk still. But Pen did not drown himself, 
 as perhaps his mother fancied might be his intention. 
 He liked to go and fish there, and think and think at 
 leisure, as the float quivered in the little eddies of the 
 pond, and the fish flapped about him. If he got a bite 
 he was excited enough: and in this way occasionally 
 brought home carps, tenches, and eels, which the Major 
 cooked in the Continental fashion. 
 
 By this pond, and under a tree, which was his favourite 
 resort, Pen composed a number of poems suitable to his 
 circumstances over which verses he blushed in after 
 days, wondering how he could ever have invented such 
 rubbish. And as for the tree, why it is in a hollow of 
 this very tree, where he used to put his tin-box of ground- 
 bait, and other fishing commodities, that he afterwards 
 but we are advancing matters. Suffice it to say, he 
 wrote poems and relieved himself very much. When a 
 man's grief or passion is at this point, it may be loud, 
 but it is not very severe. When a gentleman is cudgel- 
 ling his brain to find any rhyme for sorrow, besides bor- 
 row and to-morrow, his woes are nearer at an end than 
 he thinks for. So were Pen's. He had his hot and cold 
 fits, his days of sullenness and peevishness, and of blank 
 resignation and despondency, and occasional mad parox- 
 ysms of rage and longing, in which fits Rebecca would 
 be saddled and galloped fiercely about the country, or 
 into Chatteris, her rider gesticulating wildly on her back, 
 and astonishing carters and turnpikemen as he passed, 
 crying out the name of the false one. 
 
 Mr. Foker became a very frequent and welcome vis-
 
 PENDENNIS 211 
 
 itor at Fairoaks during this period, where his good spirits 
 and oddities always amused the Major and Pendennis, 
 while they astonished the widow and little Laura not a 
 little. His tandem made a great sensation in Clavering 
 market-place; where he upset a market stall, and cut 
 Mrs. Pybus's poodle over the shaven quarters, and drank 
 a glass of raspberry bitters at the Clavering Arms. All 
 the society in the little place heard who he was, and looked 
 out his name in their Peerages. He was so young, 
 and their books so old, that his name did not appear in 
 many of their volumes; and his mamma, now quite an 
 antiquated lady, figured amongst the progeny of the 
 Earl of Rosherville, as Lady Agnes Milton still. But 
 his name, wealth, and honourable lineage were speedily 
 known about Clavering, where you may be sure that 
 poor Pen's little transaction with the Chatteris actress 
 was also pretty freely discussed. 
 
 Looking at the little old town of Clavering St. Mary 
 from the London road as it runs by the lodge at Fair- 
 oaks, and seeing the rapid and shining Brawl winding 
 down from the town and skirting the woods of Clavering 
 Park, and the ancient church tower and peaked roofs of 
 the houses rising up amongst trees and old walls, behind 
 which swells a fair back-ground of sunshiny hills that 
 stretch from Clavering westwards towards the sea the 
 place appears to be so cheery and comfortable that many 
 a traveller's heart must have yearned towards it from 
 the coach-top, and he must have thought that it was in 
 such a calm friendly nook he would like to shelter at the 
 end of life's struggle. Tom Smith, who used to drive 
 the Alacrity coach, would often point to a tree near the 
 river, from which a fine view of the church and town was
 
 212 PENDENNIS 
 
 commanded, and inform his companion on the box that 
 " Artises come and take hofF the Church from that there 
 tree. It was a Habby once, sir: " and indeed a pretty 
 view it is, which I recommend to Mr. Stanfield or Mr. 
 Roberts, for their next tour. 
 
 Like Constantinople seen from the Bosphorus; like 
 Mrs. Rougemont viewed in her box from the opposite 
 side of the house; like many an object which we pursue 
 in life, and admire before we have attained it ; Clavering 
 is rather prettier at a distance than it is on a closer ac- 
 quaintance. The town so cheerful of aspect a few fur- 
 longs off, looks very blank and dreary. Except on mar- 
 ket days there is nobody in the streets. The clack of a 
 pair of pattens echoes through half the place, and you 
 may hear the creaking of the rusty old ensign at the 
 Clavering Arms, without being disturbed by any other 
 noise. There has not been a ball in the Assembly Rooms 
 since the Clavering volunteers gave one to their Colonel, 
 the old Sir Francis Clavering; and the stables which 
 once held a great part of that brilliant, but defunct reg- 
 iment, are now cheerless and empty, except on Thurs- 
 days, when the farmers put up there, and their tilted 
 carts and gigs make a feeble show of liveliness in the 
 place, or on Petty Sessions, when the magistrates attend 
 in what used to be the old card-room. 
 
 On the south side of the market rises up the church, 
 with its great grey towers, of which the sun illuminates 
 the delicate carving ; deepening the shadows of the huge 
 buttresses, and gilding the glittering windows, and flam- 
 ing vanes. The image of the Patroness of the Church 
 was wrenched out of the porch centuries ago: such of 
 the statues of saints as were within reach of stones and 
 hammer at that period of pious demolition, are maimed
 
 PENDENNIS 213 
 
 and headless, and of those who were out of fire, only 
 Doctor Portman knows the names and history, for his 
 curate, Smirke, is not much of an antiquarian, and Mr. 
 Simcoe (husband of the Honourable Mrs. Simcoe), in- 
 cumbent and architect of the Chapel of Ease in the lower 
 town, thinks them the abomination of desolation. 
 
 The Rectory is a stout, broad-shouldered brick house, 
 of the reign of Anne. It communicates with the church 
 and market by different gates, and stands at the opening 
 of Yew-tree Lane, where the Grammar School (Rev. 
 
 Wapshot) is; Yew-tree Cottage (Miss Flather) ; 
 
 the butcher's slaughtering-house, an old barn or brew- 
 house of the Abbey times, and the Misses Finucane's 
 establishment for young ladies. The two schools had 
 their pews in the loft on each side of the organ, until the 
 Abbey Church getting rather empty, through the falling 
 off of the congregation, who were inveigled to the Her- 
 esy-shop in the lower town, the Doctor induced the 
 Misses Finucane to bring their pretty little flock down 
 stairs; and the young ladies' bonnets make a tolerable 
 show in the rather vacant aisles. Nobody is in the great 
 pew of the Clavering family, except the statues of de- 
 funct baronets and their ladies : there is Sir Poyntz Clav- 
 ering, Knight and Baronet, kneeling in a square beard 
 opposite his wife in a ruff: a very fat lady, the Dame 
 Rebecca Clavering, in alto-relievo, is borne up to Heaven 
 by two little blue-veined angels, who seem to have a se- 
 vere task and so forth. How well in after life Pen 
 remembered those effigies, and how often in youth he 
 scanned them as the Doctor was grumbling the sermon 
 from the pulpit, and Smirke's mild head and forehead 
 curl peered over the great prayer-book in the desk ! 
 
 The Fairoaks folks were constant at the old church;
 
 2U PENDENNIS 
 
 their servants had a pew, so had the Doctor's, so had 
 Wapshot's, and those of the Misses Finucane's estab- 
 lishment, three maids and a very nice-looking young man 
 in a livery. The Wapshot family were numerous and 
 faithful. Glanders and his children regularly came to 
 church: so did one of the apothecaries. Mrs. Pybus 
 went, turn and turn about, to the Low Town church, 
 and to the Abbey : the Charity School and their families 
 of course came; Wapshot's boys made a good cheerful 
 noise, scuffling with their feet as they marched into 
 church and up the organ-loft stair, and blowing their 
 noses a good deal during the service. To be brief, the 
 congregation looked as decent as might be in these bad 
 times. The Abbey Church was furnished with a mag- 
 nificent screen, and many hatchments and heraldic tomb- 
 stones. The Doctor spent a great part of his income 
 in beautifying his darling place ; he had endowed it with 
 a superb painted window, bought in the Netherlands, 
 and an organ grand enough for a cathedral. 
 
 But in spite of organ and window, in consequence of 
 the latter very likely, which had come out of a Papistical 
 place of worship and was blazoned all over with idolatry, 
 Clavering New Church prospered scandalously in the 
 teeth of Orthodoxy; and many of the Doctor's congre- 
 gation deserted to Mr. Simcoe and the honourable 
 woman his wife. Their efforts had thinned the very 
 Ebenezer hard by them, which building before Simcoe's 
 advent used to be so full, that you could see the backs 
 of the congregation squeezing out of the arched windows 
 thereof. Mr. Simcoe's tracts fluttered into the doors of 
 all the Doctor's cottages, and were taken as greedily as 
 honest Mrs. Portman's soup, with the quality of which 
 the graceless people found fault. With the folks at the
 
 PENDENNIS 215 
 
 Ribbon Factory situated by the weir on the Brawl side, 
 and round which the Low Town had grown, Orthodoxy 
 could make no way at all. Quiet Miss Mira was put out 
 of court by impetuous Mrs. Simcoe and her female aides- 
 de-camp. Ah, it was a hard burthen for the Doctor's 
 lady to bear, to behold her husband's congregation dwin- 
 dling away ; to give the precedence on the few occasions 
 when they met to a notorious low-churchman's wife who 
 was the daughter of an Irish Peer; to know that there 
 was a party in Clavering, their own town of Clavering, 
 on which her Doctor spent a great deal more than his 
 professional income, who held him up to odium because 
 he played a rubber at whist ; and pronounced him to be 
 a Heathen because he went to the play. In her grief 
 she besought him to give up the play and the rubber, 
 indeed they could scarcely get a table now, so dreadful 
 was the outcry against the sport, but the Doctor de- 
 clared that he would do what he thought right, and what 
 the great and good George the Third did (whose Chap- 
 lain he had been) : and as for giving up whist because 
 those silly folks cried out against it, he would play 
 dummy to the end of his days with his wife and Mira, 
 rather than yield to their despicable persecutions. 
 
 Of the two families, owners of the Factory (which had 
 spoiled the Brawl as a trout-stream and brought all the 
 mischief into the town ) , the senior partner, Mr. Rolt, 
 went to Ebenezer; the junior, Mr. Barker, to the New 
 Church. In a word, people quarrelled in this little place 
 a great deal more than neighbours do in London; and 
 in the Book Club, which the prudent and conciliating 
 Pendennis had set up, and which ought to have been a 
 neutral territory, they bickered so much that nobody 
 scarcely was ever seen in the -reading-room, except
 
 216 PENDENNIS 
 
 Smirke, who, though he kept up a faint amity with the 
 Simcoe faction, had still a taste for magazines and light 
 worldly literature; and old Glanders, whose white head 
 and grizzly moustache might be seen at the window ; and 
 of course, little Mrs. Pybus, who looked at everybody's 
 letters as the Post brought them (for the Clavering 
 Reading Room, as every one knows, used to be held at 
 Baker's Library, London Street, formerly Hog Lane), 
 and read every advertisement in the paper. 
 
 It may be imagined how great a sensation was created 
 in this amiable little community when the news reached 
 it of Mr. Pen's love-passages at Chatteris. It was car- 
 ried from house to house, and formed the subject of talk 
 at high-church, low-church, and no-church tables; it was 
 canvassed by the Misses Finucane and their teachers, 
 and very likely debated by the young ladies in the 
 dormitories, for what we know ; Wapshot's big boys had 
 their version of the story and eyed Pen curiously as he 
 sate in his pew at church, or raised the finger of scorn 
 at him as he passed through Chatteris. They always 
 hated him and called him Lord Pendennis, because he 
 did not wear corduroys as they did, and rode a horse, and 
 gave himself the airs of a buck. 
 
 And, if the truth must be toldj it was Mrs. Portman 
 herself who was the chief narrator of the story of Pen's 
 loves. Whatever tales this candid woman heard, she 
 was sure to impart them to her neighbours; and after 
 she had been put into possession of Pen's secret by the 
 little scandal at Chatteris, poor Doctor Portman knew 
 that it would next day be about the parish of which he 
 was the Rector. And so indeed it was; the whole soci- 
 ety there had the legend at the news-room, at the 
 milliner's, at the shoe-shop, and the general warehouse
 
 PENDENXIS 217 
 
 at the corner of the market; at Mrs. Pybus's, at the 
 Glanders's, at the Honourable Mrs. Simcoe's soiree, at 
 the Factory; nay, through the mill itself the tale was 
 current in a few hours, and young Arthur Pendennis's 
 madness was in every mouth. 
 
 All Doctor Portman's acquaintances barked out upon 
 him when he walked the street the next day. The poor 
 divine knew that his Betsy was the author of the rumour, 
 and groaned in spirit. Well, well, it must have come 
 in a day or two, and it was as well that the town should 
 have the real story. What the Clavering folks thought 
 of Mrs. Pendennis for spoiling her son, and of that pre- 
 cocious young rascal of an Arthur, for daring to propose 
 to a play-actress, need not be told here. If pride exists 
 amongst any folks in our country, and assuredly we have 
 enough of it, there is no pride more deep-seated than that 
 of twopenny old gentlewomen in small towns. " Gra- 
 cious goodness," the cry was, " how infatuated the 
 mother is about that pert and headstrong boy who gives 
 himself the airs of a lord on his blood-horse, and for 
 whom our society is not good enough, and who would 
 marry an odious painted actress off a booth, where very 
 likely he wants to rant himself. If dear good Mr. Pen- 
 dennis had been alive this scandal would never have 
 happened." 
 
 No more it would, very likely, nor should we have been 
 occupied in narrating Pen's history. It was true that he 
 gave himself airs to the Clavering folks. Naturally 
 haughty and frank, their cackle and small talk and small 
 dignities bored him, and he showed a contempt which he 
 could not conceal. The Doctor and the Curate were the 
 only people Pen cared for in the place even Mrs. Port- 
 man shared in the general distrust of him, and of his
 
 218 PENDENNIS 
 
 mother, the widow, who kept herself aloof from the vil- 
 lage society, and was sneered at accordingly, because 
 she tried, forsooth, to keep her head up with the great 
 County families. She, indeed! Mrs. Barker at the 
 Factory has four times the butcher's meat that goes up 
 to Fairoaks, with all their fine airs. 
 
 &c. &c. &c.: let the reader fill up these details ac- 
 cording to his liking and experience of village scan- 
 dal. They will suffice to show how it was that a good 
 woman, occupied solely in doing her duty to her neigh- 
 bour and her children, and an honest, brave lad, im- 
 petuous, and full of good, and wishing well to every 
 mortal alive, found enemies and detractors amongst 
 people to whom they were superior, and to whom they 
 had never done anything like harm. The Clavering 
 curs were yelping all round the house of Fairoaks, and 
 delighted to pull Pen down. 
 
 Doctor Portman and Smirke were both cautious of in- 
 forming the widow of the constant outbreak of calumny 
 which was pursuing poor Pen, though Glanders, who 
 was a friend of the house, kept him au courant. It may 
 be imagined what his indignation was: was there any 
 man in the village whom he could call to account? Pres- 
 ently some wags began to chalk up " Fotheringay for 
 ever!" and other sarcastic allusions to late transactions 
 at Fairoaks' gate. Another brought a large play-bill 
 from Chatteris, and wafered it there one night. On one 
 occasion Pen, riding through the Low Town, fancied he 
 heard the Factory boys jeer him; and finally, going 
 through the Doctor's gate into the churchyard, where 
 some of Wapshot's boys were lounging, the biggest of 
 them, a young gentleman about twenty years of age, son 
 of a neighbouring small Squire, who lived in the doubt-
 
 "Does any body want more?'
 
 PENDENNIS 219 
 
 ful capacity of parlour-boarder with Mr. Wapshot, 
 flung himself into a theatrical attitude near a newly- 
 made grave, and began repeating Hamlet's verses over 
 Ophelia, with a hideous leer at Pen. 
 
 The young fellow was so enraged that he rushed at 
 Hobnell Major with a shriek very much resembling an 
 oath, cut him furiously across the face with the riding- 
 whip which he carried, flung it away, calling upon the 
 cowardly villain to defend himself, and in another min- 
 ute knocked the bewildered young ruffian into the grave 
 which was just waiting for a different lodger. 
 
 Then, with his fists clenched, and his face quivering 
 with passion and indignation, he roared out to Mr. Hob- 
 nell's gaping companions, to know if any of the black- 
 guards would come on? But they held back with a 
 growl, and retreated as Doctor Portman came up to 
 his wicket, and Mr. Hobnell, with his nose and lip bleed- 
 ing piteously, emerged from the grave. 
 
 Pen, looking death and defiance at the lads, who re- 
 treated towards their side of the churchyard, walked 
 back again through the Doctor's wicket, and was inter- 
 rogated by that gentleman. The young fellow was so 
 agitated he could scarcely speak. His voice broke into 
 a sob as he answered. ' The coward insulted me, sir," 
 he said; and the Doctor passed over the oath, and re- 
 spected the emotion of the honest suffering young heart. 
 
 Pendennis the elder, who, like a real man of the world, 
 had a proper and constant dread of the opinion of his 
 neighbour, was prodigiously annoyed by the absurd lit- 
 tle tempest which was blowing in Chatteris, and tossing 
 about Master Pen's reputation. Doctor Portman and 
 Captain Glanders had to support the charges of the
 
 220 PENDENNIS 
 
 whole Chatteris society against the young reprobate, who 
 was looked upon as a monster of crime. Pen did not 
 say anything about the churchyard scuffle at home ; but 
 went over to Baymouth, and took counsel with his friend 
 Harry Foker, Esq., who drove over his drag presently 
 to the Clavering Arms, whence he sent Stoopid with a 
 note to Thomas Hobnell, Esq., at the Rev. J. Wapshot's, 
 and a civil message to ask when he should wait upon that 
 gentleman. 
 
 Stoopid brought back word that the note had been 
 opened by Mr. Hobnell, and read to half-a-dozen of the 
 big boys, on whom it seemed to make a great impression ; 
 and that after consulting together and laughing, Mr. 
 Hobnell said he would send an answer " arter arternoon 
 school, which the bell was a ringing : and Mr. Wapshot, 
 he came out in his Master's gownd." Stoopid was 
 learned in academical costume, having attended Mr. 
 Foker at St. Boniface. 
 
 Mr. Foker went out to see the curiosities of Clavering 
 meanwhile ; but not having a taste for architecture, Doc- 
 tor Portman's fine church did not engage his attention 
 much, and he pronounced the tower to be as mouldy as 
 an old Stilton cheese. He walked down the street and 
 looked at the few shops there ; he saw Captain Glanders 
 at the window of the Reading-room, and having taken a 
 good stare at that gentleman, he wagged his head at him 
 in token of satisfaction; he inquired the price of meat 
 at the butcher's with an air of the greatest interest, and 
 asked "when was next killing day?" he flattened his 
 little nose against Madame Fribsby's window to see 
 if haply there was a pretty workwoman in her premises; 
 but there was no face more comely than the doll's or 
 dummy's wearing the French cap in the window, only
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 221 
 
 that of Madame Fribsby herself, dimly visible in the 
 parlour, reading a novel. That object was not of suf- 
 ficient interest to keep Mr. Foker very long in contem- 
 
 plation, and so having exhausted the town and the inn 
 stables in which there were no cattle, save the single 
 old pair of posters that earned a scanty livelihood by 
 transporting the gentry round about to the county din- 
 ners, Mr. Foker was giving himself up to ennui entirely,
 
 222 PENDENNIS 
 
 when a messenger from Mr. Hobnell was at length 
 announced. 
 
 It was no other than Mr. Wapshot himself, who came 
 with an air of great indignation, and holding Pen's mis- 
 sive in his hand, asked Mr. Foker " how dared he bring 
 such an unchristian message as a challenge to a boy of 
 his school? " 
 
 In fact Pen had written a note to his adversary of 
 the day before, telling him that if after the chastisement 
 which his insolence richly deserved, he felt inclined to 
 ask the reparation which was usually given amongst 
 gentlemen, Mr. Arthur Pendennis's friend, Mr. Henry 
 Foker, was empowered to make any arrangements for 
 the satisfaction of Mr. Hobnell. 
 
 " And so he sent you with the answer did he, sir? " 
 Mr. Foker said, surveying the Schoolmaster in his black 
 coat and clerical costume. 
 
 " If he had accepted this wicked challenge, I should 
 have flogged him," Mr. Wapshot said, and gave Mr. 
 Foker a glance which seemed to say, " and I should like 
 very much to flog you too." 
 
 " Uncommon kind of you, sir, I'm sure," said Pen's 
 emissary. " I told my principal that I didn't think the 
 other man would fight," he continued with a great air 
 of dignity. " He prefers being flogged to fighting, sir, 
 I dare say. May I offer you any refreshment, Mr. ? 
 I haven't the advantage of your name." 
 
 " My name is Wapshot, sir, and I am Master of the 
 Grammar School of this town, sir," cried the other: 
 " and I want no refreshment, sir, I thank you, and have 
 no desire to make your acquaintance, sir." 
 
 " I didn't seek yours, sir, I'm sure," replied Mr. Foker. 
 " In affairs of this sort, you see, I think it is a pity that
 
 PENDENNIS 223 
 
 the clergy should be called in, but there's no accounting 
 for tastes, sir." 
 
 " I think it's a pity that boys should talk about com- 
 mitting murder, sir, as lightly as you do," roared the 
 Schoolmaster; " and if I had you in my school 
 
 " I dare say you would teach me better, sir," Mr. 
 Foker said, with a bow. ' Thank you, sir. I've finished 
 my education, sir, and ain't a-going back to school, sir- 
 when I do, I'll remember your kind offer, sir. John, 
 show this gentleman down stairs and, of course, as Mr. 
 Hobnell likes being thrashed, we can have no objection, 
 sir, and we shall be very happy to accommodate him, 
 whenever he comes our way." 
 
 And with this, the young fellow bowed the elder gen- 
 tleman out of the room, and sate down and wrote a note 
 off to Pen, in which he informed the latter, that Mr. 
 Hobnell was not disposed to fight, and proposed to put 
 up with the caning which Pen had administered to him.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 WHICH CONCLUDES THE FIRST PART OF THIS HISTORY 
 
 EN'S conduct in this 
 business of course 
 was soon made 
 public, and an- 
 gered his friend 
 Doctor Port- 
 man not a lit- 
 tle ; while it 
 only amused 
 Major Pen- 
 
 dennis. As for the good Mrs. Pendennis, 
 she was almost distracted when she heard of 
 the squabble, and of Pen's unchristian be- 
 haviour. All sorts of wretchedness, dis- 
 comfort, crime, annoyance, seemed to come out of this 
 transaction in which the luckless boy had engaged: and 
 she longed more than ever to see him out of Chatteris 
 for a while, anywhere removed from the woman who 
 had brought him into so much trouble. 
 
 Pen when remonstrated with by this fond parent, and 
 angrily rebuked by the Doctor for his violence and fe- 
 rocious intentions, took the matter au grand scrieux, with 
 the happy conceit and gravity of youth: said that he 
 would permit no man to insult him upon this head with- 
 out vindicating his own honour, and appealing, asked 
 
 N
 
 PENDENNIS 225 
 
 whether he could have acted otherwise as a gentleman, 
 than as he did in resenting the outrage offered to him, 
 and in offering satisfaction to the person chastised? 
 
 " Vous allez trop vite, my good sir," said the uncle, 
 rather puzzled, for he had been indoctrinating his nephew 
 with some of his own notions upon the point of honour- 
 old-world notions savouring of the camp and pistol a 
 great deal more than our soberer opinions of the present 
 day " between men of the world I don't say; but be- 
 tween two schoolboys, this sort of thing is ridiculous, 
 my dear boy perfectly ridiculous." 
 
 " It is extremely wicked, and unlike my son," said 
 Mrs. Pendennis, with tears in her eyes; and bewildered 
 with the obstinacy of the boy. 
 
 Pen kissed her, and said with great pomposity, 
 ' Women, dear mother, don't understand these matters 
 I put myself into Foker's hands I had no other 
 course to pursue." 
 
 Major Pendennis grinned and shrugged his shoulders. 
 The young ones were certainly making great progress, 
 he thought. Mrs. Pendennis declared that that Foker 
 was a wicked horrid little wretch, and was sure that he 
 would lead her dear boy into mischief, if Pen went to 
 the same college with him. " I have a great mind not to 
 let him go at all," she said : and only that she remembered 
 that the lad's father had always destined him for the 
 College in which he had had his own brief education, 
 very likely the fond mother would have put a veto upon 
 his going to the University. 
 
 That he was to go, and at the next October term, had 
 been arranged between all the authorities who presided 
 over the lad's welfare. Foker had promised to introduce 
 him to the right set; and Major Pendennis laid great
 
 226 PENDENNIS 
 
 store upon Pen's introduction into College life and so- 
 ciety by this admirable young gentleman. " Mr. Foker 
 knows the very best young men now at the University," 
 the Major said, " and Pen will form acquaintances there 
 who will be of the greatest advantage through life to him. 
 The young Marquis of Plinlimmon is there, eldest son 
 of the Duke of St. David's Lord Magnus Charters is 
 there, Lord Runnymede's son ; and a first cousin of Mr. 
 Foker, ( Lady Runnymede, my dear, was Lady Agatha 
 Milton, you of course remember,) Lady Agnes will cer- 
 tainly invite him to Logwood; and far from being 
 alarmed at his intimacy with her son, who is a singular 
 and humorous, but most prudent and amiable young 
 man, to whom, I am sure, we are under every obligation 
 for his admirable conduct in the affair of the Fotherin- 
 gay marriage, I look upon it as one of the very luckiest 
 things which could have happened to Pen, that he should 
 have formed an intimacy with this most amusing young 
 gentleman." 
 
 Helen sighed, she supposed the Major knew best. 
 Mr. Foker had been very kind in the wretched business 
 with Miss Costigan, certainly, and she was grateful to 
 him. But she could not feel otherwise than a dim pre- 
 sentiment of evil ; and all these quarrels, and riots, and 
 worldliness, scared her about the fate of her boy. 
 
 Doctor Portman was decidedly of opinion that Pen 
 should go to College. He hoped the lad would read, 
 and have a moderate indulgence of the best society too. 
 He was of opinion that Pen would distinguish himself: 
 Smirke spoke very highly of his proficiency : the Doctor 
 himself had heard him construe, and thought he acquitted 
 himself remarkably well. That he should go out of 
 Chatteris was a great point at any rate; and Pen, who
 
 PENDENNIS 227 
 
 was distracted from his private grief by the various 
 rows and troubles which had risen round about him, 
 gloomily said he would obey. 
 
 There were assizes, races, and the entertainments and 
 the flux of company consequent upon them, at Chatteris, 
 during a part of the months of August and September, 
 and Miss Fotheringay still continued to act, and take 
 farewell of the audiences at the Chatteris Theatre during 
 that time. Nobody seemed to be particularly affected 
 by her presence, or her announced departure, except 
 those persons whom we have named; nor could the po- 
 lite county folks, who had houses in London, and very 
 likely admired the Fotheringay prodigiously in the cap- 
 ital, when they had been taught to do so by the Fashion 
 which set in in her favour, find anything remarkable in 
 the actress performing on the little Chatteris boards. 
 Many a genius and many a quack, for that matter, has 
 met with a similar fate before and since Miss Costigan's 
 time. This honest woman meanwhile bore up against 
 the public neglect, and any other crosses or vexations 
 which she might have in life, with her usual equanimity ; 
 and ate, drank, acted, slept, with that regularity and 
 comfort which belongs to people of her temperament. 
 What a deal of grief, care, and other harmful excite- 
 ment, does a healthy dulness and cheerful insensibility 
 avoid ! Nor do I mean to say that Virtue is not Virtue 
 because it is never tempted to go astray ; only that dul- 
 ness is a much finer gift than we give it credit for being, 
 and that some people are very lucky whom Nature has 
 endowed with a good store of that great anodyne. 
 
 Pen used to go drearily in and out from the play at 
 Chatteris during this season, and pretty much accord- 
 ing to his fancy. His proceedings tortured his mother
 
 228 PENDENNIS 
 
 not a little, and her anxiety would have led her often to 
 interfere, had not the Major constantly checked, and 
 at the same time encouraged her; for the wily man of 
 the world fancied he saw that a favourable turn had 
 occurred in Pen's malady. It was the violent efflux of 
 versification, among other symptoms, which gave Pen's 
 guardian and physician satisfaction. He might be heard 
 spouting verses in the shrubbery walks, or muttering 
 them between his teeth as he sat with the home party of 
 evenings. One day prowling about the house in Pen's 
 absence, the Major found a great book full of verses in 
 the lad's study. They were in English, and in Latin; 
 quotations from the classic authors were given in the 
 scholastic manner in the foot-notes. He can't be very 
 bad, wisely thought the Pall-Mall Philosopher: and he 
 made Pen's mother remark (not, perhaps, without a 
 secret feeling of disappointment, for she loved romance 
 like other soft women), that the young gentleman dur- 
 ing the last fortnight came home quite hungry to dinner 
 at night, and also showed a very decent appetite at the 
 breakfast table in the morning. " Gad, I wish I could," 
 said the Major, thinking ruefully of his dinner pills. 
 * The boy begins to sleep well, depend upon that." It 
 was cruel, but it was true. 
 
 Having no other soul to confide in, the lad's friend- 
 ship for the Curate redoubled, or rather, he was never 
 tired of having Smirke for a listener on that one subject. 
 What is a lover without a confidant? Pen employed 
 Mr. Smirke, as Corydon does the elm-tree, to cut out 
 his mistress's name upon. He made him echo with the 
 name of the beautiful Amaryllis. When men have left 
 off playing the tune, they do not care much for the 
 pipe: but Pen thought he had a great friendship for
 
 PENDENNIS 229 
 
 Smirke, because he could sigh out his loves and griefs 
 into his tutor's ears; and Smirke had his own reasons 
 for always being ready at the lad's call. 
 
 The poor Curate was naturally very much dismayed 
 at the contemplated departure of his pupil. When Ar- 
 thur should go, Smirke's occupation and delight would 
 go too. What pretext could he find for a daily visit to 
 Fairoaks, and that kind word or glance from the lady 
 there, which was as necessary to the Curate as the frugal 
 dinner which Madame Fribsby served him? Arthur 
 gone, he would only be allowed to make visits like any 
 other acquaintance: little Laura could not accommo- 
 date him by learning the Catechism more than once a 
 week: he had curled himself like ivy round Fairoaks: 
 he pined at the thought that he must lose his hold of the 
 place. Should he speak his mind and go down on his 
 knees to the widow ? He thought over any indications in 
 her behaviour which flattered his hopes. She had praised 
 his sermon three weeks before: she had thanked him 
 exceedingly for his present of a melon, for a small din- 
 ner party which Mrs. Pendennis gave: she said she 
 should always be grateful to him for his kindness to 
 Arthur : and when he declared that there were no bounds 
 to his love and affection for that dear boy, she had cer- 
 tainly replied in a romantic manner, indicating her own 
 strong gratitude and regard to all her son's friends. 
 Should he speak out? or should he delay? If he spoke 
 and she refused him, it was awful to think that the gate 
 of Fairoaks might be shut upon him for ever and 
 within that door lay all the world for Mr. Smirke. 
 
 Thus, oh friendly readers, we see how every man in 
 the world, has his own private griefs and business, by 
 which he is more cast down or occupied than by the af-
 
 230 PENDENNIS 
 
 fairs or sorrows of any other person. While Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis is disquieting herself about losing her son, and 
 that anxious hold she has had of him, as long as he has 
 remained in the mother's nest, whence he is about to take 
 flight into the great world beyond while the Major's 
 great soul chafes and frets, inwardly vexed as he thinks 
 what great parties are going on in London, and that he 
 might be sunning himself in the glances of Dukes and 
 Duchesses, but for those cursed affairs which keep him 
 in a wretched little country hole while Pen is tossing 
 between his passion and a more agreeable sensation, 
 unacknowledged yet, but swaying him considerably, 
 namely, his longing to see the world Mr. Smirke has 
 a private care watching at his bed side, and sitting be- 
 hind him on his pony ; and is no more satisfied than the 
 rest of us. How lonely we are in the world ! how selfish 
 and secret, everybody ! You and your wife have pressed 
 the same pillow for forty years and fancy yourself 
 united. Psha, does she cry out when you have the gout, 
 or do you lie awake when she has the tooth-ache ? Your 
 artless daughter seemingly all innocence and devoted to 
 her mamma and her piano-lesson, is thinking of neither, 
 but of the young Lieutenant with whom she danced at 
 the last ball the honest frank boy just returned from 
 school is secretly speculating upon the money you will 
 give him, and the debts he owes the tart-man. The old 
 grandmother crooning in the corner and bound to an- 
 other world within a few months, has some business or 
 cares which are quite private and her own very likely 
 she is thinking of fifty years back, and that night when 
 she made such an impression, and danced a cotillon with 
 the Captain before your father proposed for her: or, 
 what a silly little over-rated creature your wife is, and
 
 PENDENNIS 231 
 
 how absurdly you are infatuated about her and, as for 
 your wife O philosophic reader, answer and say, Do 
 you tell her all? Ah, sir a distinct universe walks about 
 under your hat and under mine all things in nature are 
 different to each the woman we look at has not the 
 same features, the dish we eat from has not the same 
 taste to the one and the other you and I are but a pair 
 of infinite isolations, with some fellow-islands a little 
 more or less near to us. Let us return, however, to the 
 solitary Smirke. 
 
 Smirke had one confidant for his passion that most 
 injudicious woman, Madame Fribsby. How she became 
 Madame Fribsby, nobody knows: she had left Claver- 
 ing to go to a milliner's in London as Miss Fribsby 
 she pretended that she had got the rank in Paris during 
 her residence in that city. But how could the Frehch 
 king, were he ever so much disposed, give her any such 
 title? We shall not inquire into this mystery, however. 
 Suffice to say, she went away from home a bouncing 
 young lass ; she returned a rather elderly character, with 
 a Madonna front and a melancholy countenance 
 bought the late Mrs. Harbottle's business for a song- 
 took her elderly mother to live with her ; was very good 
 to the poor, was constant at church, and had the best of 
 characters. But there was no one in all Clavering, not 
 Mrs. Portman herself, who read so many novels as Ma- 
 dame Fribsby. She had plenty of time for this amuse- 
 ment, for, in truth, very few people besides the folks at 
 the Rectory and Fairoaks employed her; and by a per- 
 petual perusal of such works (which were by no means 
 so moral or edifying in the days of which we write, as 
 they are at present ) , she had got to be so absurdly sen- 
 timental, that in her eyes life was nothing but an im-
 
 232 PENDENNIS 
 
 mense love-match; and she never could see two people 
 together, but she fancied they were dying for one an- 
 other. 
 
 On the day after Mrs. Pendennis's visit to the Curate, 
 which we have recorded many pages back, Madame 
 Fribsby settled in her mind that Mr. Smirke must be in 
 love with the widow, and did everything in her power 
 to encourage this passion on both sides. Mrs. Penden- 
 nis she very seldom saw, indeed, except in public, and in 
 her pew at church. That lady had very little need of 
 millinery, or made most of her own dresses and caps; 
 but on the rare occasions when Madame Fribsby received 
 visits from Mrs. Pendennis, or paid her respects at Fair- 
 oaks, she never failed to entertain the widow with praises 
 of the Curate, pointing out what an angelical man he 
 was, how gentle, how studious, how lonely ; and she would 
 wonder that no lady would take pity upon him. 
 
 Helen laughed at these sentimental remarks, and won- 
 dered that Madame herself did not compassionate her 
 lodger, and console him. Madame Fribsby shook her 
 Madonna front. " Mong cure a boco sou/fare/' she said, 
 laying her hand on the part she designated as her cure. 
 " II est more en Espang, Madame" she said with a sigh. 
 She was proud of her intimacy with the French lan- 
 guage, and spoke it with more volubility than correct- 
 ness. Mrs. Pendennis did not care to penetrate the 
 secrets of this wounded heart: except to her few inti- 
 mates she was a reserved, and it may be a very proud 
 woman; she looked upon her son's tutor merely as an 
 attendant on that young Prince, to be treated with re- 
 spect as a clergyman certainly, but with proper dignity 
 as a dependant on the house of Pendennis. Nor were 
 Madame's constant allusions to the Curate particularly
 
 The Curate's Confidante
 
 PENDENNIS 233 
 
 agreeable to her. It required a very ingenious senti- 
 mental turn indeed to find out that the widow had a 
 secret regard for Mr. Smirke, to which pernicious error 
 however Madame Fribsby persisted in holding. 
 
 Her lodger was very much more willing to talk on this 
 subject with his soft-hearted landlady. Every time after 
 that she praised the Curate to Mrs. Pendennis, she came 
 away from the latter with the notion that the widow her- 
 self had been praising him. " Eire soul au monde est 
 bien ouneeyong," she would say, glancing up at a print 
 of a French carbineer in a green coat and brass cuirass 
 which decorated her apartment " Depend upon it when 
 Master Pendennis goes to college, his Ma will find her- 
 self very lonely. She is quite young yet. You wouldn't 
 suppose her to be five-and-twenty. Monsieur le Cury f 
 song cure est touchy j'ong suissureJe conny cela 
 biangAlly Monsieur Smirke" 
 
 He softly blushed; he sighed; he hoped; he feared; 
 he doubted ; he sometimes yielded to the delightful idea 
 his pleasure was to sit in Madame Fribsby 's apart- 
 ment, and talk upon the subject, where, as the greater 
 part of the conversation was carried on in French by the 
 Milliner, and her old mother was deaf, that retired old 
 individual (who had once been a housekeeper, wife and 
 widow of a butler in the Clavering family) could under- 
 stand scarce one syllable of their talk. 
 
 When Major Pendennis announced to his nephew's 
 tutor that the young fellow would go to College in Octo- 
 ber, and that Mr. Smirke's valuable services would no 
 longer be needful to his pupil, for which services the 
 Major, who spoke as grandly as a lord, professed him- 
 self exceedingly grateful, and besought Mr. Smirke to 
 command his interest in any way the Curate felt that
 
 234 PENDENNIS 
 
 the critical moment was come for him, and was racked 
 and tortured by those severe pangs which the occasion 
 warranted. 
 
 And now that Arthur was going away, Helen's heart 
 was rather softened towards the Curate, from whom, 
 perhaps divining his intentions, she had shrunk hitherto: 
 she bethought her how very polite Mr. Smirke had been ; 
 how he had gone on messages for her; how he had 
 brought books and copied music; how he had taught 
 Laura so many things, and given her so many kind pres- 
 ents. Her heart smote her on account of her ingratitude 
 towards the Curate: so much so, that one afternoon 
 when he came down from study with Pen, and was han- 
 kering about the hall previous to his departure, she went 
 out and shook hands with him with rather a blushing 
 face, and begged him to come into her drawing-room, 
 where she said they now never saw him. And as 
 there was to be rather a good dinner that day, she 
 invited Mr. Smirke to partake of it; and we may be 
 sure that he was too happy to accept such a delightful 
 summons. 
 
 Helen was exceedingly kind and gracious to Mr. 
 Smirke during dinner, redoubling her attentions, per- 
 haps because Major Pendennis was very high and re- 
 served with his nephew's tutor. When Pendennis asked 
 Smirke to drink wine, he addressed him as if he was a 
 Sovereign speaking to a petty retainer, in a manner so 
 condescending, that even Pen laughed at it, although 
 quite ready, for his part, to be as conceited as most young 
 men are. 
 
 But Smirke did not care for the impertinences of the 
 Major so long as he had his hostess's kind behaviour; 
 and he passed a delightful time by her side at table, ex-
 
 PENDENNIS 235 
 
 erting all his powers of conversation to please her, talk- 
 ing in a manner both clerical and worldly, about the 
 fancy Bazaar, and the Great Missionary Meeting, about 
 the last new novel, and the Bishop's excellent sermon 
 about the fashionable parties in London, an account of 
 which he read in the newspapers in fine, he neglected 
 no art, by which a College divine who has both sprightly 
 and serious talents, a taste for the genteel, an irreproach- 
 able conduct, and a susceptible heart, will try and make 
 himself agreeable to the person on whom he has fixed 
 his affections. 
 
 Major Pendennis came yawning out of the dining- 
 room very soon after his sister and little Laura had left 
 the apartment. 
 
 Now Arthur, flushed with a good deal of pride at the 
 privilege of having the keys of the cellar, and remem- 
 bering that a very few more dinners would probably 
 take place which he and his dear friend Smirke could 
 share, had brought up a liberal supply of claret for the 
 company's drinking, and when the elders with little 
 Laura left him, he and the Curate began to pass the wine 
 very freely. 
 
 One bottle speedily yielded up the ghost, another shed 
 more than half its blood, before the two topers had been 
 much more than half an hour together Pen, with a hol- 
 low laugh and voice, had drunk off one bumper to the 
 falsehood of women, and had said sardonically, that wine 
 at any rate was a mistress who never deceived, and was 
 sure to give a man a welcome. 
 
 Smirke gently said that he knew for his part some 
 women who were all truth and tenderness; and casting 
 up his eyes towards the ceiling, and heaving a sigh as if 
 evoking some being dear and unmentionable, he took up
 
 236 PENDENNIS 
 
 his glass and drained it, and the rosy liquor began to 
 suffuse his face. 
 
 Pen trolled over some verses he had been making that 
 morning, in which he informed himself that the woman 
 who had slighted his passion could not be worthy to win 
 it: that he was awaking from love's mad fever, and, of 
 course, under these circumstances, proceeded to leave her, 
 and to quit a heartless deceiver : that a name which had 
 one day been famous in the land, might again be heard 
 in it : and, that though he never should be the happy and 
 careless boy he was but a few months since, or his heart 
 be what it had been ere passion had filled it and grief 
 had well-nigh killed it; that though to him personally 
 death was as welcome as life, and that he would not hes- 
 itate to part with the latter, but for the love of one kind 
 being whose happiness depended on his own, yet he 
 hoped to show he was a man worthy of his race, and that 
 one day the false one should be brought to know how 
 great was. the treasure and noble the heart which she had 
 flung away. 
 
 Pen, we say, who was a very excitable person, rolled 
 out these verses in his rich sweet voice, which trembled 
 with emotion whilst our young poet spoke. He had a 
 trick of blushing when in this excited state, and his large 
 and honest grey eyes also exhibited proofs of a sensi- 
 bility so genuine, hearty, and manly, that Miss Costigan, 
 if she had a heart, must needs have softened towards 
 him ; and very likely she was, as he said, altogether un- 
 worthy of the affection which he lavished upon her. 
 
 The sentimental Smirke was caught by the emotion 
 which agitated his young friend. He grasped Pen's 
 hand over the dessert dishes and wine glasses. He said 
 the verses were beautiful : that Pen was a poet, a great
 
 PENDENNIS 237 
 
 poet, and likely by Heaven's permission to run a great 
 career in the world. " Go on and prosper, dear Arthur," 
 he cried: "the wounds under which at present you 
 suffer are only temporary, and the very grief you en- 
 dure will cleanse and strengthen your heart. I have 
 always prophesied the greatest and brightest things of 
 you, as soon as you have corrected some failings and 
 weaknesses of character, which at present belong to you. 
 But you will get over these, my boy, you will get over 
 these; and when you are famous and celebrated, as I 
 know you will be, will you remember your old tutor and 
 the happy early days of your youth? " 
 
 Pen swore he would : with another shake of the hand 
 across the glasses and apricots. " I shall never forget 
 how kind you have been to me, Smirke," he said. " I 
 don't know what I should have done without you. You 
 are my best friend." 
 
 " Am I really, Arthur? " said Smirke, looking through 
 his spectacles; and his heart began to beat so that he 
 thought Pen must almost hear it throbbing. 
 
 " My best friend, my friend for ever" Pen said. 
 "God bless you, old boy," and he drank up the last 
 glass of the second bottle of the famous wine which his 
 father had laid in, which his uncle had bought, which 
 Lord Levant had imported, and which now, like a slave 
 indifferent, was ministering pleasure to its present 
 owner, and giving its young master delectation. 
 
 ' We'll have another bottle, old boy," Pen said, " by 
 Jove we will. Hurray! claret goes for nothing. My 
 uncle was telling me that he saw Sheridan drink five 
 bottles at Brookes's, besides a bottle of Maraschino. 
 This is some of the finest wine in England, he says. So 
 it is by Jove. There's nothing like it. Nunc vino pellite
 
 288 PENDENNIS 
 
 euros eras ingens iterabimus ceq fill your glass, Old 
 Smirke, a hogshead of it won't do you any harm." And 
 Mr. Pen began to sing the drinking song out of " Der 
 Freischiitz." The dining-room windows were open, and 
 his mother was softly pacing on the lawn outside, while 
 little Laura was looking at the sunset. The sweet fresh 
 notes of the boy's voice came to the widow. It cheered 
 her kind heart to hear him sing. 
 
 ' You you are taking too much wine, Arthur," Mr. 
 Smirke said softly " you are exciting yourself." 
 
 " No," said Pen, " women give headaches, but this 
 don't. Fill your glass, old fellow, and let's drink I 
 say, Smirke, my boy let's drink to her your her, I 
 mean, not mine, for whom I swear I'll care no more 
 no, not a penny no, not a fig no, not a glass of wine. 
 Tell us about the lady, Smirke ; I've often seen you sigh- 
 ing about her." 
 
 " Oh! " said Smirke and his beautiful cambric shirt 
 front and glistening studs heaved with the emotion which 
 agitated his gentle and suffering bosom. 
 
 " Oh what a sigh! " Pen cried, growing very hilari- 
 ous : " fill, my boy, and drink the toast, you can't refuse 
 a toast, no gentleman refuses a toast. Here's her 
 health, and good luck to you, and may she soon be Mrs. 
 Smirke." 
 
 " Do you say so? " Smirke said, all of a tremble. 
 " Do you really say so, Arthur? " 
 
 " Say so ; of course, I say so. Down with it. Here's 
 Mrs. Smirke's good health: Hip, hip, hurray! " 
 
 Smirke convulsively gulped down his glass of wine, 
 and Pen waved his over his head, cheering so as to make 
 his mother and Laura wonder on the lawn, and his uncle, 
 who was dozing over the paper in the drawing-room,
 
 PENDENNIS 239 
 
 start, and say to himself, " that boy's drinking too much." 
 Smirke put down the glass. 
 
 " I accept the omen," gasped out the blushing Curate. 
 " Oh, my dear Arthur, you you know her 
 
 " What Mira Portman? I wish you joy: she's got 
 a dev'lish large waist; but I wish you joy, old fellow." 
 
 " Oh, Arthur! " groaned the Curate again, and nod- 
 ded his head, speechless. 
 
 " Beg your pardon sorry I offended you but she 
 has got a large waist, you know devilish large waist," 
 Pen continued the third bottle evidently beginning to 
 act upon the young gentleman. 
 
 " It's not Miss Portman," the other said, in a voice 
 of agony. 
 
 " Is it anybody at Chatteris or at Clapham? Some- 
 body here? No it ain't old Pybus? it can't be Miss Rolt 
 at the Factory she's only fourteen." 
 
 " It's somebody rather older than I am, Pen," the 
 Curate cried, looking up at his friend, and then guiltily 
 casting his eyes down into his plate. 
 
 Pen burst out laughing. " It's Madame Fribsby, by 
 Jove, it's Madame Fribsby. Madame Frib. by the im- 
 mortal Gods!" 
 
 The Curate could contain no more. " O Pen," he 
 cried, " how can you suppose that any of those of those 
 more than ordinary beings you have named could have 
 an influence upon this heart, when I have been daily in 
 the habit of contemplating perfection ! I may be insane, 
 I may be madly ambitious, I may be presumptuous 
 but for two years my heart has been filled by one image, 
 and has known no other idol. Haven't I loved you as a 
 son, Arthur? say, hasn't Charles Smirke loved you as 
 a son ? "
 
 240 PENDENNIS 
 
 ' Yes, old boy, you've been very good to me," Pen 
 said, whose liking, however, for his tutor was not by any 
 means of the filial kind. 
 
 " My means," rushed on Smirke, " are at present lim- 
 ited, I own, and my mother is not so liberal as might be 
 desired; but what she has will be mine at her death. 
 Were she to hear of my marrying a lady of rank and 
 good fortune, my mother would be liberal, I am sure she 
 would be liberal. Whatever I have or subsequently in- 
 heritand it's five hundred a year at the very least- 
 would be settled upon her, and and and you at my 
 death that is" 
 
 ' What the deuce do you mean? and what have I to 
 do with your money? " cried out Pen, in a puzzle. 
 
 " Arthur, Arthur! " exclaimed the other wildly; " you 
 say I am your dearest friend Let me be more. Oh, 
 can't you see that the angelic being I love the purest, 
 the best of women is no other than your dear, dear 
 angel of a mother." 
 
 " My mother! " cried out Arthur, jumping up and 
 sober in a minute. " Pooh! damn it, Smirke, you must 
 be mad she's seven or eight years older than you are." 
 
 " Did you find that any objection? " cried Smirke pit- 
 eously, and alluding, of course, to the elderly subject 
 of Pen's own passion. 
 
 The lad felt the hint, and blushed quite red. " The 
 cases are not similar, Smirke," he said, " and the allusion 
 might have been spared. A man may forget his own 
 rank and elevate any woman to it ; but allow me to say 
 our positions are very different." 
 
 " How do you mean, dear Arthur? " the Curate inter- 
 posed sadly, cowering as he felt that his sentence was 
 about to be read.
 
 PENDENNIS 241 
 
 " Mean? " said Arthur. " I mean what I say. My 
 tutor, I say my tutor, has no right to ask a lady of my 
 mother's rank of life to marry him. It's a breach of con- 
 fidence. I say it's a liberty you take, Smirke it's a 
 liberty. Mean, indeed ! " 
 
 " O Arthur! " the Curate began to cry with clasped 
 hands, and a scared face, but Arthur gave another stamp 
 with his foot, and began to pull at the bell. " Don't let's 
 have any more of this. We'll have some coffee, if you 
 please," he said with a majestic air: and the old butler 
 entering at the summons, Arthur bade him to serve that 
 refreshment. 
 
 John said he had just carried coffee into the drawing- 
 room, where his uncle was asking for Master Arthur, 
 and the old man gave a glance of wonder at the three 
 empty claret-bottles. Smirke said he thought he'd 
 he'd rather not go into the drawing-room, on which Ar- 
 thur haughtily said " As you please," and called for Mr. 
 Smirke's horse to be brought round. The poor fellow 
 said he knew the way to the stable and would get his pony 
 himself, and he went into the hall and sadly put on his 
 coat and hat. 
 
 Pen followed him out uncovered. Helen was still 
 walking up and down the soft lawn as the sun was set- 
 ting, and the Curate took off his hat and bowed by way 
 of farewell, and passed on to the door leading to the 
 stable court by which the pair disappeared. Smirke 
 knew the way to the stable, as he said, well enough. He 
 fumbled at the girths of the saddle, which Pen fastened 
 for him, and put on the bridle and led the pony into the 
 yard. The boy was touched by the grief which appeared 
 in the other's face as he mounted. Pen held out his 
 hand, and Smirke wrung it silently.
 
 242 PENDENNIS 
 
 " I say, Smirke," he said in an agitated voice, " forgive 
 me if I have said anything harsh for you have always 
 been very, very kind to me. But it can't be, old fellow, 
 it can't be. Be a man. God bless you." 
 
 Smirke nodded his head silently, and rode out of the 
 lodge gate: and Pen looked after him for a couple of 
 minutes, until he disappeared down the road, and the 
 clatter of the pony's hoofs died away. Helen was 
 still lingering on the lawn waiting until the boy came 
 back she put his hair off his forehead and kissed it 
 fondly. She was afraid he had been drinking too 
 much wine. Why had Mr. Smirke gone away without 
 any tea? 
 
 He looked at her with a kind humour beaming in his 
 eyes; " Smirke is unwell," he said with a laugh. For a 
 long while Helen had not seen the boy looking so cheer- 
 ful. He put his arm round her waist, and walked her up 
 and down the walk in front of the house. Laura began 
 to drub on the drawing-room window and nod and laugh 
 from it. " Come along you two people," cried out Major 
 Pendennis, " your coffee is getting quite cold." 
 
 When Laura was gone to bed, Pen, who was big with 
 his secret, burst out with it, and described the dismal 
 but ludicrous scene which had occurred. Helen heard 
 of it with many blushes, which became her pale face 
 very well, and a perplexity which Arthur roguishly 
 enjoyed. 
 
 " Confound the fellow's impudence," Major Penden- 
 nis said as he took his candle, " where will the assurance 
 of these people stop? " Pen and his mother had a long 
 talk that night, full of love, confidence, and laughter, 
 and the boy somehow slept more soundly and woke up 
 more easily than he had done for many months before.
 
 PENDENNIS 243 
 
 Before the great Mr. Dolphin quitted Chatteris, he 
 not only made an advantageous engagement with Miss 
 Fotheringay, but he liberally left with her a sum of 
 money to pay off any debts which the little family might 
 have contracted during their stay in the place, and which, 
 mainly through the lady's own economy and manage- 
 ment, were not considerable. The small account with 
 the spirit merchant, which Major Pendennis had settled, 
 was the chief of Captain Costigan's debts, and though 
 the Captain at one time talked about repaying every 
 farthing of the money, it never appears that he executed 
 his menace, nor did the laws of honour in the least call 
 upon him to accomplish that threat. 
 
 When Miss Costigan had seen all the outstanding bills 
 paid to the uttermost shilling, she handed over the bal- 
 ance to her father, who broke out into hospitalities to all 
 his friends, gave the little Creeds more apples and gin- 
 gerbread than he had ever bestowed upon them, so that 
 the widow Creed ever after held the memory of her 
 lodger in veneration, and the young ones wept bitterly 
 when he went away; and in a word managed the money so 
 cleverly that it was entirely expended before many days, 
 and he was compelled to draw upon Mr. Dolphin for a 
 sum to pay for travelling expenses when the time of 
 their departure arrived. 
 
 There was held at an inn in that county town a weekly 
 meeting of a festive, almost a riotous character, of a so- 
 ciety of gentlemen who called themselves the Buccaneers. 
 Some of the choice spirits of Chatteris belonged to this 
 cheerful Club. Graves, the apothecary (than whom a 
 better fellow never put a pipe in his mouth and smoked 
 it), Smart, the talented and humorous portrait-painter 
 of High Street, Croker, an excellent auctioneer, and
 
 244 PENDENNIS 
 
 the uncompromising Hicks, the able Editor for twenty- 
 three years of the County Chronicle and Chatteris Cham- 
 pion, were amongst the crew of the Buccaneers, whom 
 also Bingley, the manager, liked to join of a Saturday 
 evening, whenever he received permission from his lady. 
 
 Costigan had been also an occasional Buccaneer. But 
 a want of punctuality of payments had of late somewhat 
 excluded him from the Society, where he was subject to 
 disagreeable remarks from the landlord, who said that 
 a Buccaneer who didn't pay his shot was utterly un- 
 worthy to be a Marine Bandit. But when it became 
 known to the 'Ears, as the Clubbists called themselves 
 familiarly, that Miss Fotheringay had made a splendid 
 engagement, a great revolution of feeling took place 
 in the Club regarding Captain Costigan. Solly, mine 
 host of the Grapes, told the gents in the Buccaneers' 
 room one night how noble the Captain had beayved; 
 having been round and paid off all his ticks in Chatteris, 
 including his score of three pound fourteen here and 
 pronounced that Cos was a good fellar, a gentleman at 
 bottom, and he, Solly, had always said so, and finally 
 worked upon the feelings of the Buccaneers to give the 
 Captain a dinner. 
 
 The banquet took place on the last night of Costigan's 
 stay at Chatteris, and was served in Solly's accustomed 
 manner. As good a plain dinner of old English fare 
 as ever smoked on a table was prepared by Mrs. Solly; 
 and about eighteen gentlemen sat down to the festive 
 board. Mr. Jubber (the eminent draper of High 
 Street) was in the Chair, having the distinguished guest 
 of the Club on his right. The able and consistent Hicks 
 officiated as croupier on the occasion; most of the gen- 
 tlemen of the Club were present, and H. Foker, Esq.,
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 245 
 
 and - - Spavin, Esq., friends of Captain Costigan, 
 were also participators in the entertainment. The cloth 
 
 ( 
 
 having been drawn, the Chairman said, " Costigan, there 
 is wine, if you like," but the Captain preferring punch, 
 that liquor was voted by acclamation : and " Non No- 
 bis " having been sung in admirable style by Messrs. 
 Bingley, Hicks, and Bullby (of the Cathedral choir,
 
 246 PENDENNIS 
 
 than whom a more jovial spirit " ne'er tossed off a 
 bumper or emptied a bowl"), the Chairman gave the 
 health of the " King! " which was drunk with the loyalty 
 of Chatteris men, and then, without further circum- 
 locution, proposed their friend " Captain Costigan." 
 
 After the enthusiastic cheering, which rang through 
 old Chatteris, had subsided, Captain Costigan rose in 
 reply, and made a speech of twenty minutes, in which 
 he was repeatedly overcome by his emotions. 
 
 The gallant Captain said he must be pardoned for in- 
 coherence, if his heart was too full to speak. He was 
 quitting a city celebrated for its antiquitee, its hospital- 
 itee, the beautee of its women, the manly fidelitee, gen- 
 erositee, and jovialitee of its men. (Cheers.) He was 
 going from that ancient and venerable city, of which, 
 while Mimoree held her sayt, he should never think with- 
 out the fondest emotion, to a methrawpolis where the 
 talents of his daughter were about to have full play, and 
 where he would watch over her like a guardian angel. 
 He should never forget that it was at Chatteris she had 
 acquired the skill which she was about to exercise in an- 
 other sphere, and in her name and his own, Jack Costi- 
 gan thanked and blessed them. The gallant officer's 
 speech was received with tremendous cheers. 
 
 Mr. Hicks, Croupier, in a brilliant and energetic man- 
 ner, proposed Miss Fotheringay's health. 
 
 Captain Costigan returned thanks in a speech full of 
 feeling and eloquence. 
 
 Mr. Jubber proposed the Drama and the Chatteris 
 Theatre, and Mr. Bingley was about to rise, but was 
 prevented by Captain Costigan, who, as long connected 
 with the Chatteris Theatre, and on behalf of his daugh- 
 ter, thanked the company. He informed them that he
 
 PENDENNIS 247 
 
 had been in garrison, at Gibraltar, and at Malta, and 
 had been at the taking of Flushing. The Duke of York 
 was a patron of the Drama ; he had the honour of dining 
 with His Royal Highness and the Duke of Kent many 
 times; and the former had justly been named the friend 
 of the soldier. (Cheers.) 
 
 The Army was then proposed, and Captain Costigan 
 returned thanks. In the course of the night, he sang 
 his well-known songs, " The Deserter," " The Shan Van 
 Voght," " The Little Pig under the Bed," and " The 
 Vale of Avoca." The evening was a great triumph for 
 him it ended. All triumphs and all evenings end. 
 And the next day, Miss Costigan having taken leave of 
 all her friends, having been reconciled to Miss Rouncy, 
 to whom she left a necklace and a white satin gown the 
 next day, he and Miss Costigan had places in the Com- 
 petitor coach rolling by the gates of Fairoaks Lodge 
 and Pendennis never saw them. 
 
 Tom Smith, the coachman, pointed out Fairoaks to 
 Mr. Costigan, who sate on the box smelling of rum-and- 
 water and the Captain said it was a poor place and 
 added, " Ye should see Castle Costigan, County Mayo, 
 me boy," which Tom said he should like very much to 
 see. 
 
 They were gone, and Pen had never seen them! He 
 only knew of their departure by its announcement in 
 the county paper the next day: and straight galloped 
 over to Chatteris to hear the truth of this news. They 
 were gone indeed. A card of " Lodgings to let," was 
 placed in the dear little familiar window. He rushed 
 up into the room and viewed it over. He sate ever so 
 long in the old window-seat looking into the Dean's Gar- 
 den: whence he and Emily had so often looked out to-
 
 248 PENDENNIS 
 
 gether. He walked, with a sort of terror, into her little 
 empty bed-room. It was swept out and prepared for 
 new comers. The glass which had reflected her fair face 
 was shining ready for her successor. The curtains lay 
 square folded on the little bed: he flung himself down 
 and buried his head on the vacant pillow. 
 
 Laura had netted a purse into which his mother had 
 put some sovereigns, and Pen had found it on his dress- 
 ing-table that very morning. He gave one to the little 
 servant who had been used to wait upon the Costigans, 
 and another to the children, because they said they were 
 very fond of her. It was but a few months back, yet 
 what years ago it seemed since he had first entered that 
 room! He felt that it was all done. The very missing 
 her at the coach had something fatal in it. Blank, weary, 
 utterly wretched and lonely the poor lad felt. 
 
 His mother saw She was gone by his look when he 
 came home. He was eager to fly too now, as were other 
 folks round about Chatteris. Poor Smirke wanted to 
 go away from the sight of the siren widow, Foker began 
 to think he had had enough of Baymouth, and that a few 
 supper parties at Saint Boniface would not be unpleas- 
 ant. And Major Pendennis longed to be off, and have 
 a little pheasant-shooting at Stillbrook, and get rid of 
 all the annoyances and tracasseries of the village. The 
 widow and Laura nervously set about the preparations 
 for Pen's kit, and filled trunks with his books and linen. 
 Helen wrote cards with the name of Arthur Pendennis, 
 Esq., which were duly nailed on the boxes; and at which 
 both she and Laura looked with tearful, wistful eyes. It 
 was not until long, long after he was gone, that Pen re- 
 membered how constant and tender the affection of these 
 women had been, and how selfish his own conduct was.
 
 PENDENNIS 249 
 
 A night soon comes, when the mail, with echoing horn 
 and blazing lamps, stops at the lodge-gate of Fairoaks, 
 and Pen's trunks and his Uncle's are placed on the roof 
 of the carriage, into which the pair presently afterwards 
 enter. Helen and Laura are standing by the evergreens 
 of the shrubbery, their figures lighted up by the coach 
 lamps; the guard cries " all right: " in another instant 
 the carriage whirls onward; the lights disappear, and 
 Helen's heart and prayers go with them. Her sainted 
 benedictions follow the departing boy. He has left the 
 home-nest in which he has been chafing, and whither, 
 after his very first flight, he returned bleeding and 
 wounded ; he is eager to go forth again and try his rest- 
 less wings. 
 
 How lonely the house looks without him ! The corded 
 trunks and book -boxes are there in his empty study. 
 Laura asks leave to come and sleep in Helen's room: 
 and when she has cried herself to sleep there, the mother 
 goes softly into Pen's vacant chamber, and kneels down 
 by the bed on which the moon is shining, and there prays 
 for her boy, as mothers only know how to plead. He 
 knows that her pure blessings are following him, as he 
 is carried miles away.
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 VERY man, however brief or in- 
 glorious may have been his aca- 
 demical career, must remember 
 with kindness and tenderness the 
 old university comrades and days. 
 The young man's life is just be- 
 ginning: the boy's lead- 
 ing strings are cut, and he 
 has all the novel delights 
 and dignities of freedom. 
 He has no idea of cares 
 yet, or of bad health, or 
 of roguery, or poverty, 
 or to-morrow's disappointment. The play has not been 
 acted so often as to make him tired. Though the after- 
 drink, as we mechanically go on repeating it, is stale and 
 bitter, how pure and brilliant was that first sparkling 
 draught of pleasure! How the boy rushes at the cup, 
 and with what a wild eagerness he drains it! But old 
 epicures who are cut off from the delights of the table, 
 and are restricted to a poached egg and a glass of water, 
 like to see people with good appetites; and, as the next 
 best thing to being amused at a pantomime one's-self 
 is to see one's children enjoy it, I hope there may be no 
 degree of age or experience to which mortal may attain, 
 when he shall become such a glum philosopher, as not 
 
 250
 
 PENDENNIS 251 
 
 to be pleased by the sight of happy youth. Coming 
 back a few weeks since from a brief visit to the old 
 University of Oxbridge, where my friend Mr. Arthur 
 Pendennis passed some period of his life, I made the 
 journey in the railroad by the side of a young fellow at 
 present a student of Saint Boniface. He had got an 
 exeat somehow, and was bent on a day's lark in London : 
 he never stopped rattling and talking from the com- 
 mencement of the journey until its close (which was a 
 great deal too soon for me, for I never was tired of listen- 
 ing to the honest young fellow's jokes and cheery laugh- 
 ter) ; and when we arrived at the terminus nothing would 
 satisfy him but a Hansom cab, so that he might get into 
 town the quicker, and plunge into the pleasures await- 
 ing him there. Away the young lad went whirling, with 
 joy lighting up his honest face ; and as for the reader's 
 humble servant, having but a small carpet-bag, I got 
 up on the outside of the omnibus, and sate there very 
 contentedly between a Jew-pedlar smoking bad cigars, 
 and a gentleman's servant taking care of a poodle-dog, 
 until we got our fated complement of passengers and 
 boxes, when the coachman drove leisurely away. We 
 weren't in a hurry to get to town. Neither one of us 
 was particularly eager about rushing into that near 
 smoking Babylon, or thought of dining at the Club that 
 night, or dancing at the Casino. Yet a few years more, 
 and my young friend of the railroad will be not a whit 
 more eager. 
 
 There were no railroads made when Arthur Penden- 
 nis went to the famous University of Oxbridge ; but he 
 drove thither in a well-appointed coach, filled inside and 
 out with dons, gownsmen, young freshmen about to 
 enter, and their guardians, who were conducting them
 
 252 PENDENNIS 
 
 to the university. A fat old gentleman, in grey stock- 
 ings, from the City, who sate by Major Pendennis in- 
 side the coach, having his pale-faced son opposite, was 
 frightened beyond measure, when he heard that the coach 
 had been driven for a couple of stages by young Mr. 
 Foker, of Saint Boniface College, who was the friend 
 of all men, including coachmen, and could drive as well 
 as Tom Hicks himself. Pen sate on the roof, examin- 
 ing coach, passengers, and country, with great delight 
 and curiosity. His heart jumped with pleasure as the 
 famous university came in view, and the magnificent 
 prospect of venerable towers and pinnacles, tall elms 
 and shining river, spread before him. 
 
 Pen had passed a few days with his uncle at the Ma- 
 jor's lodgings, in Bury Street, before they set out for 
 Oxbridge. Major Pendennis thought that the lad's 
 wardrobe wanted renewal ; and Arthur was by no means 
 averse to any plan which was to bring him new coats and 
 waistcoats. There was no end to the sacrifices which the 
 self-denying uncle made in the youth's behalf. London 
 was awfully lonely. The Pall Mall pavement was de- 
 serted; the very red- jackets had gone out of town. 
 There was scarce a face to be seen in the bow-windows 
 of the clubs. The Major conducted his nephew into one 
 or two of those desert mansions, and wrote down the lad's 
 name on the candidate-list of one of them ; and Arthur's 
 pleasure at this compliment on his guardian's part was 
 excessive. He read in the parchment volume his name 
 and titles, as " Arthur Pendennis, Esquire, of Fairoaks 
 Lodge, shire, and Saint Boniface College, Ox- 
 bridge; proposed by Major Pendennis, and seconded 
 by Viscount Colchicum," with a thrill of intense grati- 
 fication. " You will come in for ballot in about three
 
 PENDENNIS 253 
 
 years, by which time you will have taken your degree," 
 the guardian said. Pen longed for the three years to 
 be over, and surveyed the stucco-halls, and vast libraries, 
 and drawing-rooms, as already his own property. The 
 Major laughed slily to see the pompous airs of the 
 simple young fellow, as he strutted out of the building. 
 He and Foker drove down in the latter's cab one day 
 to the Grey Friars, and renewed acquaintance with some 
 of their old comrades there. The boys came crowding 
 up to the cab as it stood by the Grey Friars gates, where 
 they were entering, and admired the chestnut horse, and 
 the tights and livery and gravity of Stoopid, the tiger. 
 The bell for afternoon-school rang as they were swag- 
 gering about the play-ground talking to their old cro- 
 nies. The awful Doctor passed into school with his 
 grammar in his hand. Foker slunk away uneasily at his 
 presence, but Pen went up blushing, and shook the dig- 
 nitary by the hand. He laughed as he thought that well- 
 remembered Latin Grammar had boxed his ears many a 
 time. He was generous, good-natured, and, in a word, 
 perfectly conceited and satisfied with himself. 
 
 Then they drove to the parental brew-house. Foker's 
 Entire is composed in an enormous pile of buildings, 
 not far from the Grey Friars, and the name of that well- 
 known firm is gilded upon innumerable public-house 
 signs, tenanted by its vassals in the neighbourhood : the 
 venerable junior partner and manager did honour to the 
 young lord of the vats and his friend, and served them 
 with silver flagons of brown-stout, so strong, that you 
 would have thought, not only the young men, but the 
 very horse Mr. Harry Foker drove, was affected by the 
 potency of the drink, for he rushed home to the west-end 
 of the town at a rapid pace, which endangered the pie-
 
 254 PENDENNIS 
 
 stalls and the women on the crossings, and brought the 
 cab-steps into collision with the posts at the street cor- 
 ners, and caused Stoopid to swing fearfully on his board 
 behind. 
 
 The Major was quite pleased when Pen was with his 
 young acquaintance; listened to Mr. Foker's artless 
 stories .with the greatest interest: gave the two boys a 
 fine dinner at a Covent Garden Coffee-house, whence 
 they proceeded to the play; but was above all happy 
 when Mr. and Lady Agnes Foker, who happened to be 
 in London, requested the pleasure of Major Pendennis 
 and Mr. Arthur Pendennis's company at dinner in Gros- 
 venor Street. " Having obtained the entree into Lady 
 Agnes Foker's house," he said to Pen with an affec- 
 tionate solemnity which befitted the importance of the 
 occasion, " it behooves you, my dear boy, to keep it. 
 You must mind and never neglect to call in Grosvenor 
 Street when you come to London. I recommend you to 
 read up carefully, in Debrett, the alliances and geneal- 
 ogy of the Earls of Rosherville, and if you can, to make 
 some trifling allusions to the family, something histori- 
 cal, neat, and complimentary, and that sort of thing, 
 which you, who have a poetic fancy, can do pretty well. 
 Mr. Foker himself is a worthy man, though not of high 
 extraction or indeed much education. He always makes 
 a point of having some of the family porter served round 
 after dinner, which you will on no account refuse, and 
 which I shall drink myself, though all beer disagrees 
 with me confoundedly." And the heroic martyr did 
 actually sacrifice himself, as he said he would, on the day 
 when the dinner took place, and old Mr. Foker, at the 
 head of his table, made his usual joke about Foker's 
 Entire. We should all of us, I am sure, have liked to
 
 PENDENNIS 255 
 
 see the Major's grin, when the worthy old gentleman 
 made his time-honoured joke. 
 
 Lady Agnes, who, wrapped up in Harry, was the 
 fondest of mothers, and one of the most good-natured 
 though not the wisest of women, received her son's friend 
 with great cordiality; and astonished Pen by accounts 
 of the severe course of studies which her darling boy was 
 pursuing, and which she feared might injure his dear 
 health. Foker the elder burst into a horse-laugh at some 
 of these speeches, and the heir of the house winked his 
 eye very knowingly at his friend. And Lady Agnes 
 then going through her son's history from the earliest 
 time, and recounting his miraculous sufferings in the 
 measles and whooping-cough, his escape from drowning, 
 the shocking tyrannies practised upon him at that horrid 
 school, whither Mr. Foker would send him because he 
 had been brought up there himself, and she never would 
 forgive that disagreeable Doctor, no never Lady 
 Agnes, we say, having prattled away for an hour inces- 
 santly about her son, voted the two Messieurs Pendennis 
 most agreeable men ; and when the pheasants came with 
 the second course, which the Major praised as the very 
 finest birds he ever saw, her Ladyship said they came 
 from Logwood (as the Major knew perfectly well) and 
 hoped that they would both pay her a visit there at 
 Christmas, or when dear Harry was at home for the 
 vacations. 
 
 " God bless you, my dear boy," Pendennis said to Ar- 
 thur, as they were lighting their candles in Bury Street 
 afterwards to go to bed. * You made that little allusion 
 to Agincourt, where one of the Roshervilles distin- 
 guished himself, very neatly and well, although Lady 
 Agnes did not quite understand it: but it was exceed-
 
 256 PENDENNIS 
 
 ingly well for a beginner though you oughtn't to blush 
 so, by the way and I beseech you, my dear Arthur, to 
 remember through life, that with an entree with a good 
 entree j mind it is just as easy for you to have good 
 society as bad, and that it costs a man, when properly 
 introduced, no more trouble or soins to keep a good foot- 
 ing in the best houses in London than to dine with a 
 lawyer in Bedford Square. Mind this when you are at 
 Oxbridge pursuing your studies, and for Heaven's sake 
 be very particular in the acquaintances which you make. 
 The premier pas in life is the most important of all 
 did you write to. your mother to-day? no? well, do, 
 before you go, and call and ask Mr. Foker for a frank 
 They like it Good night. God bless you." 
 
 Pen wrote a droll account of his doings in London, 
 and the play, and the visit to the old Friars, and the 
 brewery, and the party at Mr. Foker's, to his dearest 
 mother, who was saying her prayers at home in the lonely 
 house at Fairoaks, her heart full of love and tenderness 
 unutterable for the boy: and she and Laura read that 
 letter and those which followed, many, many times, and 
 brooded over them as women do. It was the first step in 
 life that Pen was making Ah! what a dangerous jour- 
 ney it is, and how the bravest may stumble and the 
 strongest fail. Brother wayfarer! may you have a kind 
 arm to support yours on the path, and a friendly hand 
 to succour those who fall beside you. May truth guide, 
 mercy forgive at the end, and love accompany always. 
 Without that lamp how blind the traveller would be, 
 and how black and cheerless the journey! 
 
 So the coach drove up to that ancient and comfortable 
 inn the Trencher, which stands in Main Street, Ox- 
 bridge, and Pen with delight and eagerness remarked,
 
 PENDENNIS 257 
 
 for the first time, gownsmen going about, chapel bells 
 clinking (bells in Oxbridge are ringing from morning- 
 tide till even-song,) towers and pinnacles rising calm 
 and stately over the gables and antique house-roofs of 
 the city. Previous communications had taken place be- 
 tween Doctor Portman on Pen's part, and Mr. Buck, 
 Tutor of Boniface, on whose side Pen was entered ; and 
 as soon as Major Pendennis had arranged his personal 
 appearance, so that it should make a satisfactory im- 
 pression upon Pen's tutor, the pair walked down Main 
 Street, and passed the great gate and belfry-tower of 
 Saint George's College, and so came, as they were di- 
 rected, to Saint Boniface, where again Pen's heart be- 
 gan to beat as they entered at the wicket of the venerable 
 ivy-mantled gate of the College. It is surmounted with 
 an ancient dome almost covered with creepers, and 
 adorned with the effigy of the Saint from whom the 
 House takes its name, and many coats-of-arms of its 
 royal and noble benefactors. 
 
 The porter pointed out a queer old tower at the cor- 
 ner of the quadrangle, by which Mr. Buck's rooms were 
 approached, and the two gentlemen walked across the 
 square, the main features of which were at once and for 
 ever stamped in Pen's mind the pretty fountain play- 
 ing in the centre of the fair grass plats ; the tall chapel 
 windows and buttresses rising to the right ; the hall, with 
 its tapering lantern and oriel window; the lodge, from 
 the doors of which the Master issued awfully in rustling 
 silks: the lines of the surrounding rooms pleasantly 
 broken by carved chimneys, grey turrets, and quaint ga- 
 blesall these Mr. Pen's eyes drank in with an eagerness 
 which belongs to first impressions; and Major Penden- 
 nis surveyed with that calmness which belongs to a gen-
 
 258 PENDENNIS 
 
 Hi-man who does not care for the picturesque, and whose 
 eyes have been somewhat dimmed by the constant glare 
 of the pavement of Pall Mall. 
 
 Saint George's is the great College of the University 
 of Oxbridge, with its four vast quadrangles, and its 
 beautiful hall and gardens, and the Georgians, as the 
 men are called, wear gowns of a peculiar cut, and give 
 themselves no small airs of superiority over all other 
 young men. Little Saint Boniface is but a petty her- 
 mitage in comparison of the huge consecrated pile along- 
 side of which it lies. But considering its size it has 
 always kept an excellent name in the university. Its 
 ton is very good: the best families of certain counties 
 have time out of mind sent up their young men to Saint 
 Boniface: the college livings are remarkably good, the 
 fellowships easy; the Boniface men had had more than 
 their fair share of university honours; their boat was 
 third upon the river ; their chapel-choir is not inferior to 
 Saint George's itself; and the Boniface ale the best in 
 Oxbridge. In the comfortable old wainscotted College- 
 Hall, and round about Roubilliac's statue of Saint Boni- 
 face (who stands in an attitude of seraphic benediction 
 over the uncommonly good cheer of the fellows' table ) , 
 there are portraits of many most eminent Bonifacians. 
 There is the learned Doctor Griddle, who suffered in 
 Henry VIII.'s time, and Archbishop Bush who roasted 
 him there is Lord Chief Justice Hicks the Duke of 
 St. David's, K.G., Chancellor of the University and 
 Member of this College Sprott the Poet, of whose 
 fame the college is justly proud Doctor Blogg, the late 
 master, and friend of Doctor Johnson, who visited him 
 at St. Boniface and other lawyers, scholars, and 
 divines, whose portraitures look from the walls, or whose
 
 PENDENNIS 259 
 
 coats-of-arms shine in emerald and ruby, gold and azure, 
 in the tall windows of the refectory. The venerable cook 
 of the college is one of the best artists in Oxbridge, and 
 the wine in the fellows' room has long been famed for 
 its excellence and abundance. 
 
 Into this certainly not the least snugly sheltered ar- 
 bour amongst the groves of Academe, Pen now found 
 his way, leaning on his uncle's arm, and they speedily 
 reached Mr. Buck's rooms, and were conducted into the 
 apartment of that courteous gentleman. 
 
 He had received previous information from Doctor 
 Portman regarding Pen, with respect to whose family, 
 fortune, and personal merits the honest doctor had 
 spoken with no small enthusiasm. Indeed Portman had 
 described Arthur to the tutor as " a young gentleman of 
 some fortune and landed estate, of one of the most an- 
 cient families in the kingdom, and possessing such a 
 character and genius as were sure, under proper guid- 
 ance, to make him a credit to the college and the uni- 
 versity." Under such recommendations, the tutor was, 
 of course, most cordial to the young freshman and his 
 guardian, invited the latter to dine in hall, where he 
 would have the satisfaction of seeing his nephew wear 
 his gown and eat his dinner for the first time, and re- 
 quested the pair to take wine at his rooms after hall, 
 and in consequence of the highly-favourable report he 
 had received of Mr. Arthur Pendennis, said, he should 
 be happy to give him the best set of rooms to be had in 
 college a gentleman-pensioner's set, indeed, which were 
 just luckily vacant. When a College Magnate takes 
 the trouble to be polite, there is no man more splendidly 
 courteous. Immersed in their books, and excluded from 
 the world by the gravity of their occupations, these rev-
 
 2GO 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 erend men assume a solemn magnificence of compliment 
 in which they rustle and swell as in their grand robes of 
 state. Those silks and brocades are not put on for all 
 comers or every day. 
 
 When the two gentlemen had taken leave of the tutor 
 
 in his study, and had returned to Mr. Buck's ante-room, 
 or lecture-room, a very handsome apartment, Turkey- 
 carpeted, and hung with excellent prints and richly 
 framed pictures, they found the tutor's servant already 
 in waiting there, accompanied by a man with a bag full 
 of caps and a number of gowns, from which Pen might 
 select a cap and gown for himself, and the servant, no
 
 PENDENNIS 261* 
 
 doubt, would get a commission proportionable to the 
 service done by him. Mr. Pen was all in a tremor of 
 pleasure as the bustling tailor tried on a gown, and pro- 
 nounced that it was an excellent fit ; and then he put the 
 pretty college cap on, in rather a dandified manner, and 
 somewhat on one side, as he had seen Fiddicombe, the 
 youngest master at Grey Friars, wear it. And he in- 
 spected the entire costume with a great deal of satis- 
 faction in one of the great gilt mirrors which ornamented 
 Mr. Buck's lecture-room: for some of these college 
 divines are no more above looking-glasses than a lady 
 is, and look to the set of their gowns and caps quite as 
 anxiously as folks do of the lovelier sex. 
 
 Then Davis, the skip or attendant, led the way, keys 
 in hand, across the quadrangle, the Major and Pen fol- 
 lowing him, the latter blushing, and pleased with his 
 new academical habiliments, across the quadrangle to 
 the rooms which were destined for the freshman; and 
 which were vacated by the retreat of the gentleman-pen- 
 sioner, Mr. Spicer. The rooms were very comfortable, 
 with large cross beams, high wainscots, and small win- 
 dows in deep embrasures. Mr. Spicer's furniture was 
 there, and to be sold at a valuation, and Major Penden- 
 nis agreed on his nephew's behalf to take the available 
 part of it, laughingly however declining (as, indeed, 
 Pen did for his own part) six sporting prints, and four 
 groups of opera-dancers with gauze draperies, which 
 formed the late occupant's pictorial collection. 
 
 Then they went to hall, where Pen sate down and ate 
 his commons with his brother freshmen, and the Major 
 took his place at the high-table along with the collar 
 dignitaries and other fathers or guardians of youth, who 
 had come up with their sons to Oxbridge ; and after hall
 
 262 PENDENNIS 
 
 they went to Mr. Buck's to take wine; and after wine 
 to chapel, where the Major sate with great gravity in the 
 upper place, having a fine view of the Master in his 
 carved throne or stall under the organ-loft, where that 
 gentleman, the learned Doctor Donne, sate magnificent, 
 with his great prayer-book before him, an image of stat- 
 uesque piety and rigid devotion. All the young fresh- 
 men behaved with gravity and decorum, but Pen was 
 shocked to see that atrocious little Foker, who came in 
 very late, and half-a-dozen of his comrades in the gentle- 
 men-pensioners' seats, giggling and talking as if they 
 had been in so many stalls at the Opera. 
 
 Pen could hardly sleep at night in his bed-room at the 
 Trencher; so anxious was he to begin his college life, 
 and to get into his own apartments. What did he think 
 about, as he lay tossing and awake? Was it about his 
 mother at home ; the pious soul whose life was bound up 
 in his? Yes, let us hope he thought of her a little. Was 
 it about Miss Fotheringay, and his eternal passion, which 
 had kept him awake so many nights, and created such 
 wretchedness and such longing? He had a trick of 
 blushing, and if you had been in the room, and the candle 
 had not been out, you might have seen the youth's coun- 
 tenance redden more than once, as he broke out into 
 passionate incoherent exclamations regarding that luck- 
 less event of his life. His uncle's lessons had not been 
 thrown away upon him ; the mist of passion had passed 
 from his eyes now, and he saw her as she was. To think 
 that he, Pendennis, had been enslaved by such a woman, 
 and then jilted by her! that he should have stooped so 
 low, to be trampled on in the mire ! that there was a time 
 in his life, and that but a few months back, when he was 
 willing to take Costigan for his father-in-law!
 
 PENDENNIS 263 
 
 "Poor old Smirke!" Pen presently laughed out 
 " well, I'll write and try and console the poor old boy. 
 He won't die of his passion, ha, ha! " The Major, had he 
 been awake, might have heard a score of such ejacula- 
 tions uttered by Pen as he lay awake and restless through 
 the first night of his residence at Oxbridge. 
 
 It would, perhaps, have been better for a youth, the 
 battle of whose life was going to begin on the morrow, 
 to have passed the eve in a different sort of vigil: but 
 the world had got hold of Pen in the shape of his selfish 
 old Mentor : and those who have any interest in his char- 
 acter, must have perceived ere now, that this lad was 
 very weak as well as very impetuous, very vain as well as 
 very frank, and if of a generous disposition, not a little 
 selfish, in the midst of his profuseness, and also rather 
 fickle, as all eager pursuers of self -gratification are. 
 
 The six-months' passion had aged him very con- 
 siderably. There was an immense gulf between Pen the 
 victim of love, and Pen the innocent boy of eighteen, 
 sighing after it: and so Arthur Pendennis had all the 
 experience and superiority, besides that command which 
 afterwards conceit and imperiousness of disposition gave 
 him over the young men with whom he now began to 
 live. 
 
 He and his uncle passed the morning with great satis- 
 faction in making purchases for the better comfort of 
 the apartments which the lad was about to occupy. Mr. 
 Spicer's china and glass were in a dreadfully dismantled 
 condition, his lamps smashed, and his bookcases by no 
 means so spacious as those shelves which would be requi- 
 site to receive the contents of the boxes which were lying 
 in the hall at Fairoaks, and which were addressed to 
 Arthur in the hand of poor Helen.
 
 264 PENDENNIS 
 
 The boxes arrived in a few days, that his mother had 
 packed with so much care. Pen was touched as he read 
 the superscriptions in the dear well-known hand, and he 
 arranged in their proper places all the books, his old 
 friends, and all the linen and table-cloths which Helen 
 had selected from the family stock, and all the jam-pots 
 which little Laura had bound in straw, and the hundred 
 simple gifts of home.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 PENDENNIS OF BONIFACE 
 
 UR friend Pen was not sorry 
 when his Mentor took leave of 
 the young gentleman on the 
 second day after the arrival of 
 the pair in Oxbridge, and we 
 may be sure that the Major 
 on his part was very glad to 
 have discharged his duty, and 
 to have the duty over. More 
 than three months of precious 
 time had that martyr of a 
 Major given up to his nephew 
 Was ever selfish man called 
 upon to make a greater sacri- 
 fice? Do you know many men 
 or Majors who would do as much? A man will lay down 
 his head, or peril his life for his honour, but let us be shy 
 how we ask him to give up his ease or his heart's desire. 
 Very few of us can bear that trial. Let us give the 
 Major due credit for his conduct during the past quar- 
 ter, and own that he has quite a right to be pleased at 
 getting a holiday. Foker and Pen saw him off in the 
 coach, and the former youth gave particular orders to 
 the coachman to take care of that gentleman inside. It 
 pleased the elder Pendennis to have his nephew in the 
 company of a young fellow who would introduce him 
 
 865
 
 26G PENDENNIS 
 
 to the best set of the university. The Major rushed off 
 to London and thence to Cheltenham, from which water- 
 ing-place he descended upon some neighbouring great 
 houses, whereof the families were not gone abroad, and 
 where good shooting and company were to be had. 
 
 We are not about to go through young Pen's aca- 
 demical career very minutely. Alas, the life of such boys 
 does not bear telling altogether. I wish it did. I ask 
 you, does yours? As long as what we call our honour 
 is clear, I suppose your mind is pretty easy. Women are 
 pure, but not men. Women are unselfish, but not men. 
 And I would not wish to say of poor Arthur Pendennis 
 that he was worse than his neighbours, only that his 
 neighbours are bad for the most part. Let us have the 
 candour to own as much at least. Can you point out 
 ten spotless men of your acquaintance? Mine is pretty 
 large, but I can't find ten saints in the list. 
 
 During the first term of Mr. Pen's university life, he 
 attended classical and mathematical lectures with toler- 
 able assiduity; but discovering before very long time 
 that he had little taste or genius for the pursuing of the 
 exact sciences, and being perhaps rather annoyed that 
 one or two very vulgar young men, who did not even 
 use straps to their trousers so as to cover the abominably 
 thick and coarse shoes and stockings which they wore, 
 beat him completely in the lecture-room, he gave up his 
 attendance at that course, and announced to his fond 
 parent that he proposed to devote himself exclusively to 
 the cultivation of Greek and Roman Literature. 
 
 Mrs. Pendennis was, for her part, quite satisfied that 
 her darling boy should pursue that branch of learning 
 for which he had the greatest inclination; and only be- 
 sought him not to ruin his health by too much study, for
 
 PENDENNIS 267 
 
 she had heard the most melancholy stories of young stu- 
 dents, who, by over fatigue, had brought on brain-fevers 
 and perished untimely in the midst of their university 
 career. And Pen's health, which was always delicate, 
 was to be regarded, as she justly said, beyond all con- 
 siderations or vain honours. Pen, although not aware 
 of any lurking disease which was likely to endanger his 
 life, yet kindly promised his mamma not to sit up read- 
 ing too late of nights, and stuck to his word in this re- 
 spect with a great deal more tenacity of resolution than 
 he exhibited upon some other occasions, when perhaps 
 he was a little remiss. 
 
 Presently he began too to find that he learned little 
 good in the classical lecture. His fellow-students there 
 were too dull, as in mathematics they were too learned 
 for him. Mr. Buck, the tutor, was no better a scholar 
 than many a fifth-form boy at Grey Friars ; might have 
 some stupid humdrum notions about the metre and 
 grammatical construction of a passage of ^Eschylus or 
 Aristophanes, but had no more notion of the poetry than 
 Mrs. Binge, his bed-maker; and Pen grew weary of 
 hearing the dull students and tutor blunder through a 
 few lines of a play, which he could read in a tenth part 
 of the time which they gave to it. After all, private read- 
 ing, as he began to perceive, was the only study which 
 was really profitable to a man ; and he announced to his 
 mamma that he should read by himself a great deal 
 more, and in public a great deal less. That excellent 
 woman knew no more about Homer than she did about 
 Algebra, but she was quite contented with Pen's ar- 
 rangements regarding his course of studies, and felt 
 perfectly confident that her dear boy would get the place 
 which he merited.
 
 268 PENDENNIS 
 
 Pen did not come home until after Christmas, a little 
 to the fond mother's disappointment, and Laura's, who 
 was longing for him to make a fine snow fortification, 
 such as he had made three winters before. But he was 
 invited to Logwood, Lady Agnes Foker's, where there 
 were private theatricals, and a gay Christmas party of 
 very fine folks, some of them whom Major Pendennis 
 would on no account have his nephew neglect. How- 
 ever, he stayed at home for the last three weeks of the 
 vacation, and Laura had the opportunity of remarking 
 what a quantity of fine new clothes he brought with him, 
 and his mother admired his improved appearance and 
 manly and decided tone. 
 
 He did not come home at Easter ; but when he arrived 
 for the long vacation, he brought more smart clothes; 
 appearing in the morning in wonderful shooting- jackets, 
 with remarkable buttons; and in the evening in gor- 
 geous velvet waistcoats, with richly embroidered cravats, 
 and curious linen. And as she pried about his room, she 
 saw, oh, such a beautiful dressing-case, with silver mount- 
 ings, and a quantity of lovely rings and jewellery. And 
 he had a new French watch and gold chain, in place of 
 the big old chronometer, with its bunch of jingling seals, 
 which had hung from the fob of John Pendennis, and 
 by the second-hand of which the defunct doctor had felt 
 many a patient's pulse in his time. It was but a few 
 months back Pen had longed for this watch, which he 
 thought the most splendid and august time-piece in the 
 world; and just before he went to college, Helen had 
 taken it out of her trinket-box (where it had remained 
 unwound since the death of her husband) and given it 
 to Pen with a solemn and appropriate little speech re- 
 specting his father's virtues and the proper use of time.
 
 PENDENNIS 269 
 
 This portly and valuable chronometer Pen now pro- 
 nounced to be out of date, and indeed, made some com- 
 parisons between it and a warming-pan, which Laura 
 thought disrespectful, and he left the watch in a drawer, 
 in the company of soiled primrose gloves, cravats which 
 had gone out of favour, and of that other school watch 
 which has once before been mentioned in this history. 
 Our old friend, Rebecca, Pen pronounced to be no longer 
 up to his weight, and swopped her away for another and 
 more powerful horse, for which he had to pay rather a 
 heavy figure. Mrs. Pendennis gave the boy the money 
 for the new horse; and Laura cried when Rebecca was 
 fetched away. 
 
 Also Pen brought a large box of cigars branded 
 Color ados, Afrancesados, Telescopies, Fudson Oxford 
 Street, or by some such strange titles, and began to con- 
 sume these not only about the stables and green-houses, 
 where they were very good for Helen's plants, but in 
 his own study, which practice his mother did not at first 
 approve. But he was at work upon a prize-poem, he 
 said, and could not compose without his cigar, and quoted 
 the late lamented Lord Byron's lines in favour of the 
 custom of smoking. As he was smoking to such good 
 purpose, his mother could not of course refuse permis- 
 sion: in fact, the good soul coming into the room one 
 day in the midst of Pen's labours (he was consulting a 
 novel which had recentty appeared, for the cultivation of 
 the light literature of his own country as well as of for- 
 eign nations became every student) Helen, we say, 
 coming into the room and finding Pen on the sofa at 
 this work, rather than disturb him went for a light-box 
 and his cigar-case to his bed-room which was adjacent, 
 and actually put the cigar into his mouth and lighted the
 
 270 PENDENNIS 
 
 match at which he kindled it. Pen laughed, and kissed 
 his mother's hand as it hung fondly over the back of the 
 sofa. " Dear old mother," he said, " if I were to tell 
 you to burn the house down, I think you would do it." 
 And it is very likely that Mr. Pen was right, and that 
 the foolish woman would have done almost as much for 
 him as he said. 
 
 Besides the works of English " light literature " which 
 this diligent student devoured, he brought down boxes 
 of the light literature of the neighbouring country of 
 France : into the leaves of which when Helen dipped, she 
 read such things as caused her to open her eyes with won- 
 der. But Pen showed her that it was not he who made the 
 books, though it was absolutely necessary that he should 
 keep up his French by an acquaintance with the most 
 celebrated writers of the day, and that it was clearly his 
 duty to read the eminent Paul de Kock, as to study 
 Swift or Moliere. And Mrs. Pendennis yielded with a 
 sigh of perplexity. But Miss Laura was warned off the 
 books, both by his anxious mother, and that rigid moral- 
 ist Mr. Arthur Pendennis himself, who, however he 
 might be called upon to study every branch of litera- 
 ture in order to form his mind and to perfect his style, 
 would by no means prescribe such a course of read- 
 ing to a young lady whose business in life was very 
 different. 
 
 In the course of this long vacation Mr. Pen drank up 
 the bin of claret which his father had laid in, and of 
 which we have heard the son remark that there was not 
 a headache in a hogshead; and this wine being ex- 
 hausted, he wrote for a further supply to " his wine mer- 
 chants," Messrs. Binney and Latham of Mark Lane, 
 London: from whom, indeed, old Doctor Portman had
 
 PENDENNIS 271 
 
 recommended Pen to get a supply of port and sherry on 
 going to college. ' You will have, no doubt, to entertain 
 your young friends at Boniface with wine parties," the 
 honest rector had remarked to the lad. ' They used to 
 be customary at college in my time, and I would advise 
 you to employ an honest and respectable house in Lon- 
 don for your small stock of wine, rather than to have 
 recourse to the Oxbridge tradesmen, whose liquor, if I 
 remember rightly, was both deleterious in quality and 
 exorbitant in price." And the obedient young gentle- 
 man took the Doctor's advice, and patronised Messrs. 
 Binney and Latham at the rector's suggestion. 
 
 So when he wrote orders for a stock of wine to be sent 
 down to the cellars at Fairoaks, he hinted that Messrs. 
 B. and L. might send in his university account for wine 
 at the same time with the Fairoaks bill. The poor widow 
 was frightened at the amount. But Pen laughed at her 
 old-fashioned views, said that the bill was moderate, that 
 everybody drank claret and champagne now, and 
 finally, the widow paid, feeling dimly that the expenses 
 of her household were increasing considerably, and that 
 her narrow income would scarce suffice to meet them. 
 But they were only occasional. Pen merely came home 
 for a few weeks at the vacation. Laura and she might 
 pinch when he was gone. In the brief time he was with 
 them ought they not to make him happy? 
 
 Arthur's own allowances were liberal all this time; 
 indeed, much more so than those of the sons of far more 
 wealthy men. Years before, the thrifty and affectionate 
 John Pendennis, whose darling project it had ever been 
 to give his son a university education, and those advan- 
 tages of which his own father's extravagance had de- 
 prived him, had begun laying by "a store of money which
 
 272 PENDENNIS 
 
 he called Arthur's Education Fund. Year after year in 
 his book his executors found entries of sums vested as 
 A.E.F., and during the period subsequent to her hus- 
 band's decease, and before Pen's entry at college, the 
 widow had added sundry sums to this fund, so that when 
 Arthur went up to Oxbridge it reached no inconsidera- 
 ble amount. Let him be liberally allowanced, was Ma- 
 jor Pendennis's maxim. Let him make his first entree 
 into the world as a gentleman, and take his place with 
 men of good rank and station; after giving it to him, 
 it will be his own duty to hold it. There is no such bad 
 policy as stinting a boy or putting him on a lower al- 
 lowance than his fellows. Arthur will have to face the 
 world and fight for himself presently. Meanwhile we 
 shall have procured for him good friends, gentlemanly 
 habits, and have him well backed and well trained against 
 the time when the real struggle comes. And these liberal 
 opinions the Major probably advanced both because they 
 were just, and because he was not dealing with his own 
 money. 
 
 Thus young Pen, the only son of an estated country 
 gentleman, with a good allowance, and a gentlemanlike 
 bearing and person, looked to be a lad of much more 
 consequence than he was really; and was held by the 
 Oxbridge authorities, tradesmen, and undergraduates, 
 as quite a young buck and member of the aristocracy. 
 His manner was frank, brave, and perhaps a little im- 
 pertinent, as becomes a high-spirited youth. He was 
 perfectly generous and free-handed with his money, 
 which seemed pretty plentiful. He loved joviality, and 
 had a good voice for a song. Boat-racing had not risen 
 in Pen's time to the fureur which, as we are given to 
 understand, it has since attained in the university; and
 
 PENDENNIS 273 
 
 riding and tandem-driving were the fashions of the in- 
 genuous youth. Pen rode well to hounds, appeared in 
 pink, as became a young buck, and not particularly ex- 
 travagant in equestrian or any other amusement, yet 
 managed to run up a fine bill at Nile's, the livery stable- 
 keeper, and in a number of other quarters. In fact, this 
 lucky young gentleman had almost every taste to a 
 considerable degree. He was very fond of books of all 
 sorts : Doctor Portman had taught him to like rare edi- 
 tions, and his own taste led him to like beautiful bind- 
 ings. It was marvellous what tall copies, and gilding, 
 and marbling, and blind-tooling, the booksellers and 
 binders put upon Pen's book-shelves. He had a very 
 fair taste in matters of art, and a keen relish for prints 
 of a high school none of your French Opera Dancers, 
 or tawdry Racing Prints, such as had delighted the 
 simple eyes of Mr. Spicer, his predecessor but your 
 Stranges, and Rembrandt-etchings, and Wilkies before 
 the letter, with which his apartments were furnished 
 presently in the most perfect good taste, as was allowed 
 in the university, where this young fellow got no small 
 reputation. We have mentioned that he exhibited a 
 certain partiality for rings, jewellery, and fine raiment 
 of all sorts ; and it must be owned that Mr. Pen, during 
 his time at the university, was rather a dressy man, and 
 loved to array himself in splendour. He and his polite 
 friends would dress themselves out with as much care in 
 order to go and dine at each other's rooms, as other folks 
 would who were going to enslave a mistress. They said 
 he used to wear rings over his kid gloves, which he always 
 denies; but what follies will not youth perpetrate with 
 its own admirable gravity and simplicity? That he took 
 perfumed baths is a truth; and he used to say that he
 
 274 PENDENNIS 
 
 took them after meeting certain men of a very low set 
 in hall. 
 
 In Pen's second year, when Miss Fotheringay made 
 her chief hit in London, and scores of prints were pub- 
 lished of her, Pen had one of these hung in his bed-room, 
 and confided to the men of his set how awfully, how 
 wildly, how madly, how passionately, he had loved that 
 woman. He showed them in confidence the verses that 
 he had written to her, and his brow would darken, his 
 eyes roll, his chest heave with emotion as he recalled that 
 fatal period of his life, and described the woes and ago- 
 nies which he had suffered. The verses were copied out, 
 handed about, sneered at, admired, passed from coterie 
 to coterie. There are few things which elevate a lad in 
 the estimation of his brother boys, more than to have a 
 character for a great and romantic passion. Perhaps 
 there is something noble in it at all times among very 
 young men, it is considered heroic Pen was pro- 
 nounced a tremendous fellow. They said he had almost 
 committed suicide: that he had fought a duel with a 
 baronet about her. Freshmen pointed him out to each 
 other. As at the promenade time at two o'clock he 
 swaggered out of college, surrounded by his cronies, he 
 was famous to behold. He was elaborately attired. He 
 would ogle the ladies who came to lionise the University, 
 and passed before him on the arms of happy gownsmen, 
 and give his opinion upon their personal charms, or their 
 toilettes, with the gravity of a critic whose experience 
 entitled him to speak with authority. Men used to say 
 that they had been walking with Pendennis, and were 
 as pleased to be seen in his company as some of us would 
 be if we walked with a duke down Pall Mall. He and 
 the Proctor capped each other as they met, as if they
 
 275 
 
 were rival powers, and the men hardly knew which was 
 the greater. 
 
 In fact, in the course of his second year, Arthur Pen- 
 dennis had become one of the men of fashion in the 
 university. It is curious to watch that facile admiration, 
 
 and simple fidelity of youth. They hang round a leader : 
 and wonder at him, and love him, and imitate him. No 
 generous boy ever lived, I suppose, that has not had 
 some wonderment of admiration for another boy; and 
 Monsieur Pen at Oxbridge had his school, his faithful 
 band of friends, and his rivals. When the young men 
 heard at the haberdasher's shops that Mr. Pendennis, 
 of Boniface, had just ordered a crimson satin cravat, 
 you would see a couple of dozen crimson satin cravats
 
 276 PENDENNIS 
 
 in Main Street in the course of the week and Simon, 
 the Jeweller, was known to sell no less than two gross 
 of Pendennis's pins, from a pattern which the young 
 gentleman had selected in his shop. 
 
 Now if any person with an arithmetical turn of mind 
 will take the trouble to calculate what a sum of money 
 it would cost a young man to indulge freely in all the 
 above propensities which we have said Mr. Pen pos- 
 sessed, it will be seen that a young fellow, with such lib- 
 eral tastes and amusements, must needs in the course of 
 two or three years spend or owe a very handsome sum 
 of money. We have said our friend Pen had not a calcu- 
 lating turn. No one propensity of his was outrageously 
 extravagant: and it is certain that Paddington's tailor's 
 account; Guttlebury's cook's bill for dinners; Dilley 
 Tandy's bill with Finn, the print-seller, for Raphael- 
 Morghens, and Landseer proofs, and Wormall's deal- 
 ings with Parkton, the great bookseller, for Aldine edi- 
 tions, black-letter folios, and richly illuminated Missals 
 of the XVI. Century; and Snaffle's or Foker's score 
 with Nile the horse-dealer, were, each and all of them, 
 incomparably greater that any little bills which Mr. Pen 
 might run up with the above-mentioned tradesmen. But 
 Pendennis of Boniface had the advantage over all these 
 young gentlemen, his friends and associates, of a uni- 
 versality of taste: and whereas young Lord Padding- 
 ton did not care two-pence for the most beautiful print, 
 or to look into any gilt frame that had not a mirror 
 within it ; and Guttlebury did not mind in the least how 
 he was dressed, and had an aversion for horse exercise, 
 nay a terror of it; and Snaffle never read any printed 
 works but the " Racing Calendar," or " Bell's Life," or 
 cared for any manuscript except his greasy little scrawl
 
 PENDENNIS 277 
 
 of a betting-book: our catholic-minded young friend 
 occupied himself in every one of the branches of science 
 or pleasure above-mentioned, and distinguished himself 
 tolerably in each. 
 
 Hence young Pen got a prodigious reputation in the 
 university, and was hailed as a sort of Crichton ; and as 
 for the English verse prize, in competition for which we 
 have seen him busily engaged at Fairoaks, Jones of 
 Jesus carried it that year certainly, but the undergrad- 
 uates thought Pen's a much finer poem, and he had his 
 verses printed at his own expense, and distributed in 
 gilt morocco covers amongst his acquaintance. I found 
 a copy of it lately in a dusty corner of Mr. Pen's book- 
 cases, and have it before me this minute, bound up in a 
 collection of old Oxbridge tracts, university statutes, 
 prize poems by successful and unsuccessful candidates, 
 declamations recited in the college chapel, speeches de- 
 livered at the Union Debating Society, and inscribed 
 by Arthur with his name and college, Pendennis Boni- 
 face; or presented to him by his affectionate friend 
 Thompson or Jackson, the author. How strange the 
 epigraphs look in those half -boyish hands, and what a 
 thrill the sight of the documents gives one after the lapse 
 of a few lustres ! How fate, since that time, has removed 
 some, estranged others, dealt awfully with all. Many 
 a hand is cold that wrote those kindly memorials, and 
 that we pressed in the confident and generous grasp of 
 youthful friendship. What passions our friendships 
 were in those old days, how artless and void of doubt! 
 How the arm you were never tired of having linked in 
 yours under the fair college avenues or by the river side, 
 where it washes Magdalen Gardens, or Christ Church 
 Meadows, or winds by Trinity and King's, was with-
 
 278 PENDEXNIS 
 
 drawn of necessity, when you entered presently the 
 world, and each parted to push and struggle for himself 
 through the great mob on the way through life! Are 
 we the same men now that wrote those inscriptions that 
 read those poems? that delivered or heard those essays 
 and speeches so simple, so pompous, so ludicrously sol- 
 emn ; parodied so artlessly from books, and spoken with 
 smug chubby faces, and such an admirable aping of 
 wisdom and gravity ? Here is the book before me : it is 
 scarcely fifteen years old. Here is Jack moaning with 
 despair and Byronic misanthropy, whose career at the 
 university was one of unmixed milk-punch. Here is 
 Tom's daring Essay in defence of suicide and of re- 
 publicanism in general, a propos of the death of Roland 
 and the Girondins Tom's, who wears the starchest tie 
 in all the diocese, and would go to Smithfield rather than 
 eat a beefsteak on a Friday in Lent. Here is Bob, of the 
 - Circuit, who has made a fortune in Railroad Com- 
 mittees, bellowing out with Tancred and Godfrey, 
 " On to the breach, ye soldiers of the cross. Scale the 
 red wall and swim the choking foss. Ye dauntless 
 archers, twang your cross-bows well; On, bill and bat- 
 tle-axe and mangonel ! Ply battering-ram and hurtling 
 catapult, Jerusalem is ours id Deus vult" After 
 which comes a mellifluous description of the gardens of 
 Sharon and the maids of Salem, and a prophecy that 
 roses shall deck the entire country of Syria, and a speedy 
 reign of peace be established all in undeniably decasyl- 
 labic lines, and the queerest aping of sense and sentiment 
 and poetry. And there are Essays and Poems along 
 with these grave parodies, and boyish exercises (which 
 are at once frank and false, and so mirthful, yet, some- 
 how, so mournful), by youthful hands, that shall never
 
 PENDENNIS 279 
 
 write more. Fate has interposed darkly, and the young 
 voices are silent, and the eager brains have ceased to 
 work. This one had genius and a great descent, and 
 seemed to be destined for honours which now are of little 
 worth to him: that had virtue, learning, genius every 
 faculty and endowment which might secure love, admira- 
 tion, and worldly fame : an obscure and solitary church- 
 yard contains the grave of many fond hopes, and the 
 pathetic stone which bids them farewell. I saw the sun 
 shining on it in the fall of last year, and heard the sweet 
 village choir raising anthems round about. What boots 
 whether it be Westminster or a little country spire which 
 covers your ashes, or if, a few days sooner or later, the 
 world forgets you? 
 
 Amidst these friends then, and a host more, Pen 
 passed more than two brilliant and happy years of his 
 life. He had his fill of pleasure and popularity. No 
 dinner or supper-party was complete without him; and 
 Pen's jovial wit, and Pen's songs, and dashing courage, 
 and frank and manly bearing, charmed all the under- 
 graduates. Though he became the favourite and leader 
 of young men who were much his superiors in wealth and 
 station, he was much too generous to endeavour to pro- 
 pitiate them by any meanness or cringing on his own 
 part, and would not neglect the humblest man of his 
 acquaintance in order to curry favour with the richest 
 young grandee in the university. His name is still re- 
 membered at the Union Debating Club, as one of the 
 brilliant orators of his day. By the way, from having 
 been an ardent Tory in his freshman's year, his princi- 
 ples took a sudden turn afterwards, and he became a 
 Liberal of the most violent order. He avowed himself 
 a Dantonist, and asserted that Louis the Sixteenth was
 
 280 PENDENNIS 
 
 served right. And as for Charles the First, he vowed 
 that he would chop off that monarch's head with his own 
 right hand were he then in the room at the Union De- 
 bating Club, and had Cromwell no other executioner for 
 the traitor. He and Lord Magnus Charters, the Mar- 
 quis of Runnymede's son, before-mentioned, were the 
 most truculent republicans of their day. 
 
 There are reputations of this sort made quite inde- 
 pendent of the collegiate hierarchy, in the republic of 
 gownsmen. A man may be famous in the Honour-lists 
 and entirely unknown to the undergraduates : who elect 
 kings and chieftains of their own, whom they admire 
 and obey,, as negro-gangs have private black sovereigns 
 in their own body, to whom they pay an occult obedience, 
 besides that which they publicly profess for their owners 
 and drivers. Among the young ones Pen became fa- 
 mous and popular: not that he did much, but there was 
 a general determination that he could do a great deal if 
 he chose. " Ah, if Pendennis of Boniface would but 
 try," the men said, " he might do anything." He was 
 backed for the Greek Ode won by Smith of Trinity; 
 everybody was sure he would have the Latin hexameter 
 prize which Brown of St. John's, however, carried off, 
 and in this way one university honour after another was 
 lost by him, until, after two or three failures, Mr. Pen 
 ceased to compete. But he got a declamation prize in 
 his own college, and brought home to his mother and 
 Laura at Fairoaks a set of prize-books begilt with the 
 college arms, and so big, well-bound, and magnificent, 
 that these ladies thought there had been no such prize 
 ever given in a college before as this of Pen's, and that 
 he had won the very largest honour which Oxbridge was 
 capable of awarding.
 
 PENDENNIS 281 
 
 As vacation after vacation and term after term 
 passed away without the desired news that Pen had 
 sate for any scholarship or won any honour, Doctor 
 Portman grew mightily gloomy in his behaviour towards 
 Arthur, and adopted a sulky grandeur of deport- 
 ment towards him, which the lad returned by a 
 similar haughtiness. One vacation he did not call upon 
 the Doctor at all, much to his mother's annoyance, who 
 thought that it was a privilege to enter the Rectory- 
 house at Clavering, and listened to Dr. Portman's 
 antique jokes and stories, though ever so often 
 repeated, with unfailing veneration. " I cannot stand 
 the Doctor's patronising air," Pen said. " He's too 
 kind to me, a great deal too fatherly. I have seen in 
 the world better men than him, and I am not going to 
 bore myself by listening to his dull old stories." The 
 tacit feud between Pen and the Doctor made the widow 
 nervous, so that she too avoided Portman, and was afraid 
 to go to the Rectory when Arthur was at home. 
 
 One Sunday in the last long vacation, the wretched 
 boy pushed his rebellious spirit so far as not to go to 
 church, and he was seen at the gate of the Clavering 
 Arms smoking a cigar, in the face of the congregation as 
 it issued from St. Mary's. There was an awful sensa- 
 tion in the village society, Portman prophesied Pen's 
 ruin after that, and groaned in spirit over the rebellious 
 young prodigal. 
 
 So did Helen tremble in her heart, and little Laura 
 Laura had grown to be a fine young stripling by this 
 time, graceful and fair, clinging round Helen and wor- 
 shipping her, with a passionate affection. Both of these 
 women felt that their boy was changed. He was no 
 longer the artless Pen of old days, so brave, so artless,
 
 282 PENDENNIS 
 
 so impetuous, and tender. His face looked careworn 
 and haggard, his voice had a deeper sound, and tones 
 more sarcastic. Care seemed to be pursuing him; but 
 he only laughed when his mother questioned him, and 
 parried her anxious queries with some scornful jest. 
 Nor did he spend much of his vacations at home; he 
 went on visits to one great friend or another, and scared 
 the quiet pair at Fairoaks by stories of great houses 
 whither he had been invited, and by talking of lords 
 without their titles. 
 
 Honest Harry Foker, who had been the means of 
 introducing Arthur Pendennis to that set of young men 
 at the university, from whose society and connections 
 Arthur's uncle expected that the lad would get so much 
 benefit; who had called for Arthur's first song at his 
 first supper-party; and who had presented him at the 
 Barmecide Club, where none but the very best men of 
 Oxbridge were admitted (it consisted in Pen's time of 
 six noblemen, eight gentlemen pensioners, and twelve 
 of the most select commoners of the university), soon 
 found himself left far behind by the young freshman 
 in the fashionable world of Oxbridge, and being a gen- 
 erous and worthy fellow, without a spark of envy in his 
 composition, was exceedingly pleased at the success of 
 his young protege, and admired Pen quite as much as 
 any of the other youth did. It was he who followed 
 Pen now, and quoted his sayings ; learned his songs, and 
 retailed them at minor supper-parties, and was never 
 weary of hearing them from the gifted young poet's 
 own mouth for a good deal of the time which Mr. Pen 
 might have employed much more advantageously in the 
 pursuit of the regular scholastic studies, was given up 
 to the composition of secular ballads, which he sang 
 about at parties according to university wont.
 
 PENDENNIS 283 
 
 It had been as well for Arthur if the honest Foker 
 had remained for some time at college, for, with all his 
 vivacity, he was a prudent young man, and often curbed 
 Pen's propensity to extravagance: but Foker's collegi- 
 ate career did not last very long after Arthur's entrance 
 at Boniface. Repeated differences with the university 
 authorities caused Mr. Foker to quit Oxbridge in an 
 untimely manner. He would persist in attending races 
 on the neighbouring Hungerford Heath, in spite of the 
 injunctions of his academic superiors. He never could 
 be got to frequent the chapel of the college with that 
 regularity of piety which Alma Mater demands from 
 her children; tandems, which are abominations in the 
 eyes of the heads and tutors, were Foker's greatest de- 
 light, and so reckless was his driving and frequent the 
 accidents and upsets out of his drag, that Pen called 
 taking a drive with him taking the " Diversions of Pur- 
 ley ; " finally, having a dinner-party at his rooms to en- 
 tertain some friends from London, nothing would 
 satisfy Mr. Foker but painting Mr. Buck's door ver- 
 milion, in which freak he was caught by the proctor; 
 and although young Black Strap, the celebrated negro- 
 fighter, who was one of Mr. Foker's distinguished guests, 
 and was holding the can of paint while the young artist 
 operated on the door, knocked down two of the proctor's 
 attendants and performed prodigies of valour, yet these 
 feats rather injured than served Foker, whom the proc- 
 tor knew very well and who was taken with the brush in 
 his hand, summarily convened and sent down from the 
 university. 
 
 The tutor wrote a very kind and feeling letter to Lady 
 Agnes on the subject, stating that everybody was fond 
 of the youth ; that he never meant harm to any mortal 
 creature; that he for his own part would have been
 
 284 PENDENNIS 
 
 delighted to pardon the harmless little boyish frolic, had 
 not its unhappy publicity rendered it impossible to look 
 the freak over, and breathing the most fervent wishes 
 for the young fellow's welfare wishes no doubt sincere, 
 for Foker, as we know, came of a noble family on his 
 mother's side, and on the other was heir to a great num- 
 ber of thousand pounds a year. 
 
 " It don't matter," said Foker, talking over the matter 
 with Pen, " a little sooner or a little later, what is the 
 odds? I should have been plucked for my little go 
 again, I know I should that Latin I cannot screw into 
 my head, and my mamma's anguish would have broke 
 out next term. The Governor will blow like an old 
 grampus, I know he will, well, we must stop till he 
 gets his wind again. I shall probably go abroad and 
 improve my mind with foreign travel. Yes, parly voo's 
 the ticket. It'ly, and that sort of thing. I'll go to Paris, 
 and learn to dance and complete my education. But 
 it's not me I'm anxious about, Pen. As long as people 
 drink beer I don't care, it's about you I'm doubtful, 
 my boy. You're going too fast, and can't keep up the 
 pace, I tell you. It's not the fifty you owe me, pay it 
 or not when you like, but it's the every-day pace, and 
 I tell you it will kill you. You're livin' as if there was 
 no end to the money in the stockin' at home. You 
 oughtn't to give dinners, you ought to eat 'em. Fellows 
 are glad to have you. You oughtn't to owe horse bills, 
 you ought to ride other chaps' nags. You know no more 
 about betting than I do about algebra: the chaps will 
 win your money as sure as you sport it. Hang me if 
 you are not trying at everything. I saw you sit down 
 to icarte last week at Trumpington's, and taking your 
 turn with the bones after Ringwood's supper. They'll
 
 PENDENNIS 285 
 
 beat you at it, Pen, my boy, even if they play on the 
 square, which I don't say they don't, nor which I don't 
 say they do, mind. But I won't play with 'em. You're 
 no match for 'em. You ain't up to their weight. It's 
 like little Black Strap standing up to Tom Spring, 
 the Black's a pretty fighter, but, Law bless you, his arm 
 ain't long enough to touch Tom, and I tell you, you're 
 going it with fellers beyond your weight. Look here 
 If you'll promise me never to bet nor touch a box nor a 
 card, I'll let you off the two ponies." 
 
 But Pen, laughingly, said, " that though it wasn't 
 convenient to him to pay the two ponies at that moment, 
 he by no means wished to be let off any just debts he 
 owed;" and he and Foker parted not without many 
 dark forebodings on the latter's part with regard to his 
 friend, who Harry thought was travelling speedily on 
 the road to ruin. 
 
 " One must do at Rome as Rome does," Pen said, in 
 a dandified manner, jingling some sovereigns in his 
 waistcoat pocket. " A little quiet play at ecarte can't 
 hurt a man who plays pretty well I came away four- 
 teen sovereigns richer from Ringwood's supper, and, 
 gad! I wanted the money." And he walked off, after 
 having taken leave of poor Foker, who went away with- 
 out any beat of drum, or offer to drive the coach out of 
 Oxbridge, to superintend a little dinner which he was 
 going to give at his own rooms in Boniface, about which 
 dinners, the cook of the college, who had a great respect 
 for Mr. Pendennis, always took especial pains for his 
 young favourite.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 RAKES PROGRESS 
 
 O in Pen's second 
 year Major 
 Pendennis paid 
 a brief visit to 
 his nephew, and 
 was introduced 
 to several of 
 Pen's univer- 
 sity friends 
 the gentle and 
 polite Lord 
 Plinlimmon, the 
 gallant and 
 open-hearted Magnus Charters, the sly and witty Har- 
 land ; the intrepid Ringwood, who was called Rupert in 
 the Union Debating Club, from his opinions and the 
 bravery of his blunders; Broadbent, styled Barebones 
 Broadbent from the republican nature of his opinions (he 
 was of a dissenting family from Bristol, and a perfect 
 Boanerges of debate) ; and Bloundell-Bloundell, whom 
 Mr. Pen entertained at a dinner whereof his uncle was 
 the chief guest. 
 
 The Major said, " Pen, my boy, your dinner went off 
 a merveille; you did the honours very nicely you 
 carved well I am glad you learned to carve it is done 
 on the side-board now in most good houses, but is still
 
 PENDENNIS 287 
 
 an important point, and may aid you in middle-life 
 young Lord Plinlimmon is a very amiable young man, 
 quite the image of his dear mother (whom I knew as 
 Lady Aquila Brownbill) ; and Lord Magnus's republi- 
 canism will wear off it sits prettily enough on a young 
 patrician in early life, though nothing is so loathsome 
 among persons of our rank Mr. Broadbent seems to 
 have much eloquence and considerable reading; your 
 friend Foker is always delightful; but your acquain- 
 tance, Mr. Bloundell, struck me as in all respects a most 
 ineligible young man." 
 
 " Bless my soul, sir, Bloundell-Bloundell ! " cried Pen, 
 laughing: " why, sir, he's the most popular man of the 
 
 university. He was in the Dragoons before he 
 
 came up. We elected him of the Barmecides the first 
 week he came up had a special meeting on purpose 
 he's of an excellent family Suffolk Bloundells, de- 
 scended from Richard's Blondel, bear a harp in chief 
 and motto O Mong Roy." 
 
 " A man may have a very good coat-of-arms, and be 
 a tiger, my boy," the Major said, chipping his egg; 
 " that man is a tiger, mark my word a low man. I 
 will lay a wager that he left his regiment, which was a 
 good one (for a more respectable man than my friend, 
 Lord Martingale, never sat in a saddle), in bad odour. 
 There is the unmistakable look of slang and bad habits 
 about this Mr. Bloundell. He frequents low gambling- 
 houses and billiard hells, sir he haunts third-rate clubs 
 I know he does. I know by his style. I never was 
 mistaken in my man yet. Did you remark the quantity 
 of rings and jewellery he wore? That person has Scamp 
 written on his countenance, if any man ever had. Mark 
 my words and avoid him. Let us turn the conversation.
 
 288 PENDENNIS 
 
 The dinner was a leetle too fine, but I don't object to 
 your making a few extra frais when you receive friends. 
 Of course you don't do it often, and only those whom it 
 is your interest to Jeter. The cutlets were excellent, and 
 the souffle uncommonly light and good. The third bottle 
 of champagne was not necessary; but you have a good 
 income, and as long as you keep within it, I shall not 
 quarrel with you, my dear boy." , 
 
 Poor Pen! the worthy uncle little knew how often 
 those dinners took place, while the reckless young Am- 
 phitryon delighted to show his hospitality and skill in 
 gourmandise. There is no art about which boys are more 
 anxious to have an air of knowingness. A taste and 
 knowledge of wines and cookery appears to them to be 
 the sign of an accomplished roue and manly gentleman. 
 Pen, in his character of Admirable Crichton, thought it 
 necessary to be a great judge and practitioner of dinners; 
 we have just said how the college cook respected him, 
 and shall soon have to deplore that that worthy man so 
 blindly trusted our Pen. In the third year of the lad's 
 residence at Oxbridge, his staircase was by no means 
 encumbered with dish-covers and desserts, and waiters 
 carrying in dishes, and skips opening iced champagne; 
 crowds of different sorts of attendants, with faces sulky 
 or piteous, hung about the outer oak, and assailed the 
 unfortunate lad as he issued out of his den. 
 
 Nor did his guardian's advice take any effect, or in- 
 duce Mr. Pen to avoid the society of the disreputable 
 Mr. Bloundell. 
 
 The young magnates of the neighboring great Col- 
 lege of St. George's, who regarded Pen, and in whose 
 society he lived, were not taken in by Bloundell's flashy 
 graces, and rakish airs of fashion. Broadbent called him
 
 Pen's Staircase. 1 
 
 A little Dinner
 
 PENDENNIS 289 
 
 Captain Macheath, and said he would live to be hanged. 
 Foker, during his brief stay at the university with Mac- 
 heath, with characteristic caution, declined to say any- 
 thing in the Captain's disfavour, but hinted to Pen that 
 he had better have him for a partner at whist than play 
 against him, and better back him at ecarte than bet on 
 the other side. ' You see, he plays better than you do, 
 Pen," was the astute young gentleman's remark: "he 
 plays uncommon well, the Captain does; and Pen, I 
 wouldn't take the odds too freely from him, if I was 
 you. I don't think he's too flush of money, the Captain 
 ain't." But beyond these dark suggestions and generali- 
 ties, the cautious Foker could not be got to speak. 
 
 Not that his advice would have had more weight with 
 a headstrong young man, than advice commonly has 
 with a lad who is determined on pursuing his own way. 
 Pen's appetite for pleasure was insatiable, and he rushed 
 at it wherever it presented itself, with an eagerness which 
 bespoke his fiery constitution and youthful health. He 
 called taking pleasure " seeing life," and quoted well- 
 known maxims from Terence, from Horace, from 
 Shakspeare, to show that one should do all that might 
 become a man. He bade fair to be utterly used up and 
 a roui, in a few years, if he were to continue at the pace 
 at which he was going. 
 
 One night after a supper-party in college, at which 
 Pen and Macheath had been present, and at which a little 
 quiet vingt-et-un had been played, as the men had taken 
 their caps and were going away, after no great losses 
 or winnings on any side, Mr. Bloundell playfully took 
 up a green wine-glass from the supper-table, which had 
 been destined to contain iced cup, but into which he in- 
 serted something still more pernicious, namely a pair of
 
 290 PENDENNIS 
 
 dice, which the gentleman took out of his waistcoat pocket 
 and put into the glass. Then giving the glass a graceful 
 wave which showed that his hand was quite experienced 
 in the throwing of dice, he called seven's the main, and 
 whisking the ivory cubes gently on the table, swept them 
 up lightly again from the cloth, and repeated this pro- 
 cess two or three times. The other men looked on, Pen, 
 of course, among the number, who had never used the 
 dice as yet, except to play a humdrum game of back- 
 gammon at home. 
 
 Mr. Bloundell, who had a good voice, began to troll 
 out the chorus from " Robert the Devil," an Opera then 
 in great vogue, in which chorus many of the men joined, 
 especially Pen, who was in very high spirits, having won 
 a good number of shillings and half-crowns at the vingt- 
 et-un and presently, instead of going home, most of 
 the party were seated round the table playing at dice, 
 the green glass going round from hand to hand until 
 Pen finally shivered it, after throwing six mains. 
 
 From that night Pen plunged into the delights of the 
 game of hazard, as eagerly as it was his custom to pur- 
 sue any new pleasure. Dice can be played of mornings 
 as well as after dinner or supper. Bloundell would come 
 into Pen's rooms after breakfast, and it was astonishing 
 how quick the time passed as the bones were rattling. 
 They had little quiet parties with closed doors, and 
 Bloundell devised a box lined with felt, so that the dice 
 should make no noise, and their tell-tale rattle not bring 
 the sharp-eared tutors up to the rooms. Bloundell, 
 Ringwood, and Pen were once very nearly caught by 
 Mr. Buck, who, passing in the Quadrangle, thought he 
 heard the words " Two to one on the caster," through 
 Pen's open window; but when the tutor got into Ar-
 
 PENDENNIS 291 
 
 thur's rooms he found the lads with three Homers be- 
 fore them, and Pen said, he was trying to coach the two 
 other men, and asked Mr. Buck with great gravity what 
 was the present condition of the River Scamander, and 
 whether it was navigable or no? 
 
 Mr. Arthur Pendennis did not win much money in 
 these transactions with Mr. Bloundell, or indeed gain 
 good of any kind except a knowledge of the odds at 
 hazard, which he might have learned out of books. 
 
 One Easter vacation, when Pen had announced to his 
 mother and uncle his intention not to go down, but stay 
 at Oxbridge and read, Mr. Pen was nevertheless induced 
 to take a brief visit to London in company with his 
 friend Mr. Bloundell. They put up at a hotel in Co- 
 vent Garden, where Bloundell had a tick, as he called 
 it, and took the pleasures of the town very freely after 
 the wont of young university men. Bloundell still be- 
 longed to a military club, whither he took Pen to dine 
 once or twice (the young men would drive thither in a 
 cab, trembling lest they should meet Major Pendennis 
 on his beat in Pall Mall), and here Pen was introduced 
 to a number of gallant young fellows with spurs and 
 moustachios, with whom he drank pale-ale of mornings 
 and beat the town of a night. Here he saw a deal of 
 life, indeed: nor in his career about the theatres and 
 singing-houses which these roaring young blades fre- 
 quented, was he very likely to meet his guardian. One 
 night, nevertheless, they were very near to each other: 
 a plank only separating Pen, who was in the boxes of 
 the Museum Theatre, from the Major, who was in Lord 
 Steyne's box, along with that venerated nobleman. The 
 Fotheringay was in the pride of her glory. She had 
 made a hit: that is, she had drawn very good houses for
 
 292 PENDENNIS 
 
 nearly a year, had starred the provinces with great eclat, 
 had come back to shine in London with somewhat dimin- 
 ished lustre, and now was acting with " ever increasing 
 attraction, &c.," " triumph of the good old British 
 drama," as the play-bills avowed, to houses in which 
 there was plenty of room for anybody who wanted to 
 see her. 
 
 It was not the first time Pen had seen her, since that 
 memorable day when the two had parted in Chatteris. 
 In the previous year, when the town was making much 
 of her, and the press lauded her beauty, Pen had found 
 a pretext for coming to London in term-time, and had 
 rushed off to the theatre to see his old flame. He recol- 
 lected it rather than renewed it. He remembered how 
 ardently he used to be on the look out at Chatteris, when 
 the speech before Ophelia's or Mrs. Haller's entrance on 
 the stage was made by the proper actor. Now, as the 
 actor spoke, he had a sort of feeble thrill: as the house 
 began to thunder with applause, and Ophelia entered 
 with her old bow and sweeping curtsey, Pen felt a slight 
 shock and blushed very much as he looked at her, and 
 could not help thinking that all the house was regarding 
 him. He hardly heard her for the first part of the play : 
 and he thought with such rage of the humiliation to 
 which she had subjected him, that he began to fancy 
 he was jealous and in love with her still. But that illu- 
 sion did not last very long. He ran round to the stage 
 door of the theatre to see her if possible, but he did not 
 succeed. She passed indeed under his nose with a fe- 
 made companion, but he did not know her, nor did she 
 recognise him. The next night he came in late, and 
 stayed very quietly for the afterpiece, and on the third 
 and last night of his stay in London why, Taglioni was
 
 PENDENNIS 293 
 
 going to dance at the Opera, Taglioni! and there was 
 to be Don Giovanni, which he admired of all things 
 in the world: so Mr. Pen went to Don Giovanni and 
 Taglioni. 
 
 This time the illusion about her was quite gone. She 
 was not less handsome, but she was not the same, some- 
 how. The light was gone out of her eyes which used to 
 flash there, or Pen's no longer were dazzled by it. The 
 rich voice spoke as of old, yet it did not make Pen's 
 bosom thrill as formerly. He thought he could recog- 
 nise the brogue underneath: the accents seemed to him 
 coarse and false. It annoyed him to hear the same 
 emphasis on the same words, only uttered a little louder : 
 worse than this, it annoyed him to think that he should 
 ever have mistaken that loud imitation for genius, or 
 melted at those mechanical sobs and sighs. He felt that 
 it was in another life almost, that it was another man who 
 had so madly loved her. He was ashamed and bitterly 
 humiliated, and very lonely. Ah, poor Pen! the delu- 
 sion is better than the truth sometimes, and fine dreams 
 than dismal waking. 
 
 They went and had an uproarious supper that night, 
 and Mr. Pen had a fine headache the next morning, with 
 which he went back to Oxbridge, having spent all his 
 ready money. 
 
 As all this narrative is taken from Pen's own con- 
 fessions, so that the reader may be assured of the truth 
 of every word of it, and as Pen himself never had any 
 accurate notion of the manner in which he spent his 
 money, and plunged himself in much deeper pecuniary 
 difficulties, during his luckless residence at Oxbridge 
 University, it is, of course, impossible for me to give 
 any accurate account of his involvements, beyond that
 
 294 PENDENNIS 
 
 general notion of his way of life, which we have sketched 
 a few pages back. He does not speak too hardly of the 
 roguery of the university tradesmen, or of those in Lon- 
 don whom he honoured with his patronage at the outset 
 of his career. Even Finch, the money-lender, to whom 
 Bloundell introduced him, and with whom he had vari- 
 ous transactions, in which the young rascal's signature 
 appeared upon stamped paper, treated him, according 
 to Pen's own account, with forbearance, and never 
 mulcted him of more than a hundred per cent. The old 
 college-cook, his fervent admirer, made him a private 
 bill, offered to send him in dinners up to the very last, 
 and never would have pressed his account to his dying 
 day. There was that kindness and frankness about Ar- 
 thur Pendennis, which won most people who came in 
 contact with him, and which, if it rendered him an easy 
 prey to rogues, got him, perhaps, more good-will than he 
 merited from many honest men. It was impossible to 
 resist his good nature, or, in his worst moments, not to 
 hope for his rescue from utter ruin. 
 
 At the time of his full career of university pleasure, 
 he would leave the gayest party to go and sit with a sick 
 friend. He never knew the difference between small 
 and great in the treatment of his acquaintances, how- 
 ever much the unlucky lad's tastes, which were of the 
 sumptuous order, led him to prefer good society ; he was 
 only too ready to share his guinea with a poor friend, 
 and when he got money had an irresistible propensity for 
 paying, which he never could conquer through life. 
 
 In his third year at college, the duns began to gather 
 awfully round about him, and there was a levee at his 
 oak which scandalised the tutors, and would have scared 
 many a stouter heart. With some of these he used to
 
 PENDENNIS 295 
 
 battle, some he would bully (under Mr. Bloundell's 
 directions, who was a master in this art, though he took 
 a degree in no other), and some deprecate. And it is 
 reported of him that little Mary Frodsham, the daughter 
 of a certain poor gilder and frame-maker, whom Mr. 
 Pen had thought fit to employ, and who had made a 
 number of beautiful frames for his fine prints, coming 
 to Pendennis with a piteous tale that her father was ill 
 with ague, and that there was an execution in their house, 
 Pen in an anguish of remorse rushed away, pawned his 
 grand watch and every single article of jewellery except 
 two old gold sleeve-buttons, which had belonged to his 
 father, and rushed with the proceeds to Frodsham's shop, 
 where, with tears in his eyes, and the deepest repentance 
 and humility, he asked the poor tradesman's pardon. 
 
 This, young gentleman, is not told as an instance of 
 Pen's virtue, but rather of his weakness. It would have 
 been much more virtuous to have had no prints at all. 
 He still owed for the baubles which he sold in order to 
 pay Frodsham's bill, and his mother had cruelly to pinch 
 herself in order to discharge the jeweller's account, so 
 that she was in the end the sufferer by the lad's imperti- 
 nent fancies and follies. We are not presenting Pen 
 to you as a hero or a model, only as a lad, who, in the 
 midst of a thousand vanities and weaknesses, has as yet 
 some generous impulses, and is not altogether dishonest. 
 
 We have said it was to the scandal of Mr. Buck the 
 tutor that Pen's extravagances became known : from the 
 manner in which he entered college, the associates he 
 kept, and the introductions of Doctor Portman and the 
 Major, Buck for a long time thought that his pupil was 
 a man of large property, and wondered rather that he 
 only wore a plain gown. Once on going up to London
 
 296 PENDENNIS 
 
 to the levee with an address from His Majesty's Loyal 
 University of Oxbridge, Buck had seen Major Penden- 
 nis at St. James's in conversation with two knights of 
 the garter, in the carriage of one of whom the dazzled 
 tutor saw the Major whisked away after the levee. He 
 asked Pen to wine the instant he came back, let him off 
 from chapels and lectures more than ever, and felt per- 
 fectly sure that he was a young gentleman of large 
 estate. 
 
 Thus, he was thunderstruck when he heard the truth, 
 and received a dismal confession from Pen. His uni- 
 versity debts were large, and the tutor had nothing to do, 
 and of course Pen did not acquaint him, with his London 
 debts. What man ever does tell all when pressed by his 
 friends about his liabilities? The tutor learned enough 
 to know that Pen was poor, that he had spent a hand- 
 some, almost a magnificent allowance, and had raised 
 around him such a fine crop of debts, as it would be very 
 hard work for any man to mow down; for there is no 
 plant that grows so rapidly when once it has taken root. 
 
 Perhaps it was because she was so tender and good 
 that Pen was terrified lest his mother should know of 
 his sins. " I can't bear to break it to her," he said to the 
 tutor in an agony of grief, " Ol sir, I've been a villain 
 to her " and he repented, and he wished he had the time 
 to come over again, and he asked himself, " Why, why 
 did his uncle insist upon the necessity of living with 
 great people, and in how much did all his grand acquain- 
 tance profit him ? " 
 
 They were not shy, but Pen thought they were, and 
 slunk from them during his last terms at college. He 
 was as gloomy as a death's-head at parties, which he 
 avoided of his own part, or to which his young friends
 
 Pen's Staircase. 2 
 
 A few little Bills
 
 PENDENNIS 297 
 
 soon ceased to invite him. Everybody knew that Pen- 
 dennis was " hard up." That man Bloundell, who could 
 pay nobody, and who was obliged to go down after three 
 terms, was his ruin, the men said. His melancholy figure 
 might be seen shirking about the lonely quadrangles in 
 his battered old cap and torn gown, and he who had been 
 the pride of the university but a year before, the man 
 whom all the young ones loved to look at, was now the 
 object of conversation at freshmen's wine parties, and 
 they spoke of him with wonder and awe. 
 
 At last came the Degree Examinations. Many a 
 young man of his year whose hob-nailed shoes Pen had 
 derided, and whose face or coat he had caricatured 
 many a man whom he had treated with scorn in the lec- 
 ture-room or crushed with his eloquence in the debating- 
 club many of his own set who had not half his brains, 
 but a little regularity and constancy of occupation, took 
 high places in the honours or passed with decent credit. 
 And where in the list was Pen the superb, Pen the wit 
 and dandy, Pen the poet and orator? Ah, where was 
 Pen the widow's darling and sole pride? Let us hide 
 our heads, and shut up the page. The lists came out; 
 and a dreadful rumour rushed through the university, 
 that Pendennis of Boniface was plucked.
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 FLIGHT AFTER DEFEAT 
 
 TOURING the latter 
 *-^ part of Pen's resi- 
 dence at the Univer- 
 sity of Oxbridge, his 
 uncle's partiality had 
 greatly increased for 
 the lad. The Major 
 was proud of Ar- 
 thur, who had high 
 spirits, frank man- 
 ners, a good person, 
 and high gentleman- 
 like bearing. It pleased the old London bachelor to see 
 Pen walking with the young patricians of his university, 
 and he (who was never known to entertain his friends, 
 and whose stinginess had passed into a sort of byword 
 among some wags at the Club, who envied his many 
 engagements, and did not choose to consider his pov- 
 erty) was charmed to give his nephew and the young 
 lords snug little dinners at his lodgings, and to regale 
 them with good claret, and his very best bons mots and 
 stories: some of which would be injured by the repeti- 
 tion, for the Major's manner of telling them was incom- 
 parably neat and careful ; and others, whereof the repe- 
 tition would do good to nobody. He paid his court 
 
 999
 
 PENDENNIS 299 
 
 to their parents through the young men, and to himself 
 as it were by their company. He made more than one 
 visit to Oxbridge, where the young fellows were amused 
 by entertaining the old gentleman, and gave parties and 
 breakfasts, and fetes, partly to joke him and partly to 
 do him honour. He plied them with his stories. He 
 made himself juvenile and hilarious in the company of 
 the young lords. He went to hear Pen at a grand debate 
 at the Union, crowed and cheered, and rapped his stick 
 in chorus with the cheers of the men, and was astounded 
 at the boy's eloquence and fire. He thought he had got 
 a young Pitt for a nephew. He had an almost paternal 
 fondness for Pen. He wrote to the lad letters with play- 
 ful advice and the news of the town. He bragged about 
 Arthur at his Clubs, and introduced him with pleasure 
 into his conversation; saying, that, Egad, the young 
 fellows were putting the old ones to the wall; that the 
 lads who were coming up, young Lord Plinlimmon, a 
 friend of my boy, young Lord Magnus Charters, a chum 
 of my scapegrace, &c., would make a greater figure in 
 the world than ever their fathers had done before them. 
 He asked permission to bring Arthur to a grand fete 
 at Gaunt House; saw him with ineffable satisfaction 
 dancing with the sisters of the young noblemen before 
 mentioned; and gave himself as much trouble to pro- 
 cure cards of invitation for the lad to some good houses, 
 as if he had been a mamma with a daughter to marry, 
 and not an old half -pay officer in a wig. And he boasted 
 everywhere of the boy's great talents, and remarkable 
 oratorical powers; and of the brilliant degree he was 
 going to take. Lord Runnymede would take him on 
 his embassy, or the Duke would bring him in for one of 
 his boroughs, he wrote over and over again to Helen;
 
 300 PENDENNIS 
 
 who, for her part, was too ready to believe anything that 
 anybody chose to say in favour of her son. 
 
 And all this pride and affection of uncle and mother 
 had been trampled down by Pen's wicked extravagance 
 and idleness ! I don't envy Pen's feelings ( as the phrase 
 is), as he thought of what he had done. He had slept, 
 and the tortoise had won the race. He had marred at 
 its outset what might have been a brilliant career. He 
 had dipped ungenerously into a generous mother's 
 purse; basely and recklessly spilt her little cruse. O! 
 it was a coward hand that could strike and rob a creature 
 so tender. And if Pen felt the wrong which he had done 
 to others, are we to suppose that a young gentleman of 
 his vanity did not feel still more keenly the shame he had 
 brought upon himself? Let us be assured that there is 
 no more cruel remorse than that; and no groans more 
 piteous than those of wounded self-love. Like Joe 
 Miller's friend, the Senior Wrangler, who bowed to the 
 audience from his box at the play, because he and the 
 king happened to enter the theatre at the same time, only 
 with a fatuity by no means so agreeable to himself, poor 
 Arthur Pendennis felt perfectly convinced that all Eng- 
 land would remark the absence of his name from the 
 examination-lists, and talk about his misfortune. His 
 wounded tutor, his many duns, the skip and bed-maker 
 who waited upon him, the undergraduates of his own 
 time and the years below him, whom he had patronised 
 or scorned how could he bear to look any of them in 
 the face now? He rushed to his rooms, into which he 
 shut himself, and there he penned a letter to his tutor, 
 full of thanks, regards, remorse, and despair, request- 
 ing that his name might be taken off the college books, 
 and intimating a wish and expectation that death would
 
 PENDENNIS 301 
 
 speedily end the woes of the disgraced Arthur Pen- 
 dennis. 
 
 Then he slunk out, scarcely knowing whither he went, 
 but mechanically taking the unfrequented little lanes by 
 the backs of the colleges, until he cleared the university 
 precincts, and got down to the banks of the Camisis river, 
 now deserted, but so often alive with the boat-races, and 
 the crowds of cheering gownsmen, he wandered on and 
 on, until he found himself at some miles' distance from 
 Oxbridge, or rather was found by some acquaintance, 
 leaving that city. 
 
 As Pen went up a hill, a drizzling January rain beat- 
 ing in his face, and his ragged gown flying behind him 
 for he had not divested himself of his academical gar- 
 ments since the morning a postchaise came rattling up 
 the road, on the box of which a servant was seated, whilst 
 within, or rather half out of the carriage window, sate 
 a young gentleman smoking a cigar, and loudly encour- 
 aging the postboy. It was our young acquaintance of 
 Baymouth, Mr. Spavin, who had got his degree, and 
 was driving homewards in triumph in his yellow post- 
 chaise. He caught a sight of the figure, madly gesticu- 
 lating as he worked up the hill, and of poor Pen's pale 
 and ghastly face as the chaise whirled by him. 
 
 ' Wo! " roared Mr. Spavin to the postboy, and the 
 horses stopped in their mad career, and the carriage 
 pulled up some fifty yards before Pen. He presently 
 heard his own name shouted, and beheld the upper half 
 of the body of Mr. Spavin thrust out of the side-window 
 of the vehicle, and beckoning Pen vehemently towards it. 
 
 Pen stopped, hesitated nodded his head fiercely, and 
 pointed onwards, as if desirous that the postilion should 
 proceed. He did not speak: but his countenance must
 
 302 PENDENNIS 
 
 have looked very desperate, for young Spavin, having 
 stared at him with an expression of blank alarm, jumped 
 out of the carriage presently, ran towards Pen holding 
 out his hand, and grasping Pen's said, " I say hullo, old 
 boy, where are you going, and what's the row now? " 
 
 ' I'm going where I deserve to go," said Pen with an 
 imprecation. 
 
 ' This ain't the way," said Mr. Spavin, smiling. 
 ' This is the Fenbury road. I say, Pen, don't take on 
 because you are plucked. It's nothing when you are 
 used to it. I've been plucked three times, old boy and 
 after the first time I didn't care. Glad it's over, though. 
 You'll have better luck next time." 
 
 Pen looked at his early acquaintance, who had been 
 plucked, who had been rusticated, who had only, after 
 repeated failures, learned to read and write correctly, 
 and who, in spite of all these drawbacks, had attained 
 the honour of a degree. ' This man has passed," he 
 thought, " and I have failed! " It was almost too much 
 for him to bear. 
 
 " Good bye, Spavin," said he; "I'm very glad you 
 are through. Don't let me keep you; I'm in a hurry 
 I'm going to town to-night." 
 
 " Gammon," said Mr. Spavin. ' This ain't the way 
 to town; this is the Fenbury road, I tell you." 
 
 " I was just going to turn back," Pen said. 
 
 " All the coaches are full with the men going down," 
 Spavin said. Pen winced. ' You'd not get a place for 
 a ten-pound note. Get into my yellow ; I'll drop you at 
 Mudford, where you have a chance of the Fenbury mail. 
 I'll lend you a hat and a coat, I've got lots. Come along ; 
 jump in, old boy go it, leathers! "and in this way 
 Pen found himself in Mr. Spavin's postchaise, and rode
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 303 
 
 with that gentleman as far as the Ram Inn at Mudford, 
 fifteen miles from Oxbridge; where the Fenbury mail 
 
 changed horses, and where Pen got a place on to 
 London. 
 
 The next day there was an immense excitement in 
 Boniface College, Oxbridge, where, for some time, a 
 rumour prevailed, to the terror of Pen's tutor and trades- 
 men, that Pendennis, maddened at losing his degree, had 
 made away with himself a battered cap, in which his
 
 304 PENDENNIS 
 
 name was almost discernible, together with a seal bear- 
 ing his crest of an eagle looking at a now extinct sun, 
 had been found three miles on the Fenbury road, near 
 a mill stream; and, for four-and-twenty hours, it was 
 supposed that poor Pen had flung himself into the 
 stream, until letters arrived from him, bearing the Lon- 
 don post-mark. 
 
 The mail reached London at the dreary hour of five; 
 and he hastened to the inn at Covent Garden, at which 
 he was accustomed to put up, where the ever-wakeful 
 porter admitted him, and showed him to a bed. Pen 
 looked hard at the man, and wondered whether Boots 
 knew he was plucked? When in bed he could not sleep 
 there. He tossed about until the appearance of the dis- 
 mal London daylight, when he sprang up desperately, 
 and walked off to his uncle's lodgings in Bury Street; 
 where the maid, who was scouring the steps, looked up 
 suspiciously at him, as he came with an unshaven face, 
 and yesterday's linen. He thought she knew of his mis- 
 hap, too. 
 
 " Good 'evens! Mr. Harthur, what 'as 'appened, sir? " 
 Mr. Morgan, the valet, asked, who had just arranged the 
 well-brushed clothes and shiny boots at the door of his 
 master's bed-room, and was carrying in his wig to the 
 Major. 
 
 " I want to see my uncle," he cried, in a ghastly voice, 
 and flung himself down on a chair. 
 
 Morgan backed before the pale and desperate-looking 
 young man, with terrified and wondering glances, and 
 disappeared into his master's apartment. 
 
 The Major put his head out of the bed-room door, as 
 soon as he had his wig on. 
 
 ' What? examination over? Senior Wrangler, double
 
 PENDENNIS 305 
 
 First Class, hay? " said the old gentleman" I'll come 
 directly; " and the head disappeared. 
 
 " They don't know what has happened," groaned Pen ; 
 " what will they say when they know all? " 
 
 Pen had been standing with his back to the window, 
 and to such a dubious light as Bury Street enjoys of a 
 foggy January morning, so that his uncle could not see 
 the expression of the young man's countenance, or the 
 looks of gloom and despair which even Mr. Morgan had 
 remarked. 
 
 But when the Major came out of his dressing-room 
 neat and radiant, and preceded by faint odours from 
 Delcroix's shop, from which emporium Major Penden- 
 nis's wig and his pocket-handkerchief got their perfume, 
 he held out one of his hands to Pen, and was about 
 addressing him in his cheery high-toned voice, when 
 he caught sight of the boy's face at length, and drop- 
 ping his hand, said, "Good God! Pen, what's the 
 matter? " 
 
 " You'll see it in the papers at breakfast, sir," Pen 
 said. 
 
 " See what? " 
 
 " My name isn't there, sir." 
 
 " Hang it, why should it be? " asked the Major, more 
 perplexed. 
 
 " I have lost everything, sir," Pen groaned out; " my 
 honour's gone ; I'm ruined irretrievably ; I can't go back 
 to Oxbridge." 
 
 " Lost your honour? " screamed out the Major. 
 " Heaven alive! you don't mean to say you have shown 
 the white feather?" 
 
 Pen laughed bitterly at the word feather, and repeated 
 it. " No, it isn't that, sir. I'm not afraid of being shot;
 
 306 PENDENNIS 
 
 I wish to God anybody would shoot me. I have not got 
 my degree. I I'm plucked, sir." 
 
 The Major had heard of plucking, but in a very vague 
 and cursory way, and concluded that it was some cere- 
 mony performed corporally upon rebellious university 
 youth. " I wonder you can look me in the face after 
 such a disgrace, sir," he said; " I wonder you submitted 
 to it as a gentleman." 
 
 " I couldn't help it, sir. I did my classical papers well 
 enough : it was those infernal mathematics, which I have 
 always neglected." 
 
 " Was it was it done in public, sir? " the Major said. 
 
 "What?" 
 
 " The the plucking? " asked the guardian, looking 
 Pen anxiously in the face. 
 
 Pen perceived the error under which his guardian was 
 labouring, and in the midst of his misery the blunder 
 caused the poor wretch a faint smile, and served to bring 
 down the conversation from the tragedy-key, in which 
 Pen had been disposed to carry it on. He explained to 
 his uncle that he had gone in to pass his examination, 
 and failed. On which the Major said, that though he 
 had expected far better things of his nephew, there was 
 no great misfortune in this, and no dishonour as far as 
 he saw, and that Pen must try again. 
 
 " Me again at Oxbridge," Pen thought, " after such 
 a humiliation as that!" He felt that, except he went 
 down to burn the place, he could not enter it. 
 
 But it was when he came to tell his uncle of his debts 
 that the other felt surprise and anger most keenly, and 
 broke out into speeches most severe upon Pen, which 
 the lad bore, as best he might, without flinching. He 
 had determined to make a clean breast, and had formed
 
 PENDENNIS 307 
 
 a full, true, and complete list of all his bills and lia- 
 bilities at the university, and in London. They con- 
 sisted of various items, such as 
 
 London Tailor. Oxbridge do. 
 
 Oxbridge do. Bill for horses. 
 
 Haberdasher, for shirts and gloves. Printseller. 
 
 Jeweller. Books. 
 
 College Cook. Binding. 
 
 Crump, for desserts. Hairdresser and Perfumery. 
 
 Bootmaker. Hotel Bill in London. 
 
 Wine Merchant in London. Sundries. 
 
 All which items the reader may fill in at his pleasure 
 such accounts have been inspected by the parents of 
 many university youth, and it appeared that Mr. Pen's 
 bills in all amounted to about seven hundred pounds; 
 and, furthermore, it was calculated that he had had more 
 than twice that sum of ready money during his stay at 
 Oxbridge. This sum he had spent, and for it had to 
 show what? 
 
 ' You need not press a man who is down, sir," Pen 
 said to his uncle, gloomily. " I know very well, how 
 wicked and idle I have been. My mother won't like to 
 see me dishonoured, sir," he continued, with his voice 
 failing; " and I know she will pay these accounts. But 
 I shall ask her for no more money." 
 
 " As you like, sir," the Major said. " You are of age, 
 and my hands are washed of your affairs. But you can't 
 live without money, and have no means of making it 
 that I see, though you have a fine talent in spending it, 
 and it is my belief that you will proceed as you have be- 
 gun, and ruin your mother before you are five years 
 older. Good morning; it is time for me to go to break-
 
 308 PENDENNIS 
 
 fast. My engagements won't permit me to see you much 
 during the time that you stay in London. I presume 
 that you will acquaint your mother with the news which 
 you have just conveyed to me." 
 
 And pulling on his hat, and trembling in his limbs 
 somewhat, Major Pendennis walked out of his lodgings 
 before his nephew, and went ruefully off to take his 
 accustomed corner at the Club. He saw the Oxbridge 
 examination-lists in the morning papers, and read over 
 the names, not understanding the business, with mourn- 
 ful accuracy. He consulted various old fogies of his 
 acquaintance, in the course of the day, at his Clubs; 
 Wenham, a Dean, various Civilians ; and, as it is called, 
 " took their opinion," showing to some of them the 
 amount of his nephew's debts, which he had dotted down 
 on the back of a card, and asking what was to be done, 
 and whether such debts were not monstrous, preposter- 
 ous? What was to be done? There was nothing for it 
 but to pay. Wenham and the others told the Major of 
 young men who owed twice as much five times as much 
 as Arthur, and with no means at all to pay. The con- 
 sultations, and calculations, and opinions, comforted the 
 Major somewhat. After all, he was not to pay. 
 
 But he thought bitterly of the many plans he had 
 formed to make a man of his nephew, of the sacrifices 
 which he had made, and of the manner in which he was 
 disappointed. And he wrote off a letter to Doctor Port- 
 man, informing him of the direful events which had 
 taken place, and begging the Doctor to break them to 
 Helen. For the orthodox old gentleman preserved the 
 regular routine in all things, and was of opinion that it 
 was more correct to " break " a piece of bad news to a 
 person by means of a (possibly maladroit and unfeeling)
 
 PENDENNIS 309 
 
 messenger, than to convey it simply to its destination by 
 a note. So the Major wrote to Doctor Portman, and 
 then went out to dinner, one of the saddest men in any 
 London dining-room that day. 
 
 Pen, too, wrote his letter, and skulked about London 
 streets for the rest of the day, fancying that everybody 
 was looking at him and whispering to his neighbour, 
 ' That is Pendennis of Boniface, who was plucked yes- 
 terday." His letter to his mother was full of tender- 
 ness and remorse: he wept the bitterest tears over it 
 and the repentance and passion soothed him to some 
 degree. 
 
 He saw a party of roaring young blades from Ox- 
 bridge in the coffee-room of his hotel, and slunk away 
 from them, and paced the streets. He remembers, he 
 says, the prints which he saw hanging up at Ackermann's 
 window in the rain, and a book which he read at a stall 
 near the Temple : at night he went to the pit of the play, 
 and saw Miss Fotheringay, but he doesn't in the least 
 recollect in what piece. 
 
 On the second day there came a kind letter from his 
 tutor, containing many grave and appropriate remarks 
 upon the event which had befallen him, but strongly urg- 
 ing Pen not to take his name off the university books, 
 and to retrieve a disaster, which, everybody knew, was 
 owing to his own carelessness alone, and which he might 
 repair by a month's application. He said he had or- 
 dered Pen's skip to pack up some trunks of the young 
 gentleman's wardrobe, which duly arrived with fresh 
 copies of all Pen's bills laid on the top. 
 
 On the third day there arrived a letter from Home; 
 which Pen read in his bedroom, and the result of which
 
 310 PENDENNIS 
 
 was that he fell down on his knees, with his head in the 
 bed-clothes, and there prayed out his heart, and humbled 
 himself; and having gone down stairs and eaten an im- 
 mense breakfast, he sallied forth and took his place at 
 the Bull and Mouth, Piccadilly, by the Chatteris coach 
 for that evening.
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 PRODIGALS RETURN 
 
 UCH a letter as the Major 
 wrote, of course sent 
 Doctor Portman to Fair- 
 oaks, and he went off with 
 that alacrity which a 
 good man shows when he 
 has disagreeable news to 
 communicate. He wishes 
 the deed were done, and 
 done quickly. He is 
 sorry, but que voulez- 
 vous? the tooth must be 
 taken out, and he has you 
 into the chair, and it is 
 surprising with what courage and vigour of wrist he ap- 
 plies the forceps. Perhaps he would not be quite so 
 active or eager if it were his tooth ; but, in fine, it is your 
 duty to have it out. So the Doctor, having read the epis- 
 tle out to Mira and Mrs. Portman, with many damna- 
 tory comments upon the young scapegrace who was go- 
 ing deeper and deeper into perdition, left those ladies 
 to spread the news through the Clavering society, which 
 they did with their accustomed accuracy and despatch, 
 and strode over to Fairoaks to break the intelligence to 
 the widow. 
 
 She had the news already. She had read Pen's letter, 
 
 311
 
 312 PENDENNIS 
 
 and it had relieved her somehow. A gloomy presentiment 
 of evil had been hanging over her for many, many 
 months past. She knew the worst now, and her darling 
 boy was come back to her repentant and tender-hearted. 
 Did she want more? All that the Rector could say (and 
 his remarks were both dictated by common sense, and 
 made respectable by antiquity) could not bring Helen 
 to feel any indignation or particular unhappiness, ex- 
 cept that the boy should be unhappy. What was this 
 degree that they made such an outcry about, and what 
 good would it do Pen? Why did Doctor Portman and 
 his uncle insist upon sending the boy to a place where 
 there was so much temptation to be risked, and so little 
 good to be won? Why didn't they leave him at home 
 with his mother? As for his debts, of course they must 
 be paid; his debts! wasn't his father's money all his, 
 and hadn't he a right to spend it? In this way the 
 widow met the virtuous Doctor, and all the arrows of 
 his indignation somehow took no effect upon her gen- 
 tle bosom. 
 
 For some time past, an agreeable practice, known 
 since times ever so ancient, by which brothers and sisters 
 are wont to exhibit their affection towards one another, 
 and in which Pen and his little sister Laura had been 
 accustomed to indulge pretty frequently in their child- 
 ish days, had been given up by the mutual consent of 
 those two individuals. Coming back from college after 
 an absence from home of some months, in place of the 
 simple girl whom he had left behind him, Mr. Arthur 
 found a tall, slim, handsome young lady, to whom he 
 could not somehow proffer the kiss which he had been 
 in the habit of administering previously, and who re- 
 ceived him with a gracious curtsey and a proffered hand,
 
 PENDENNIS 313 
 
 and with a great blush which rose up to the cheek, just 
 upon the very spot which young Pen had been used to 
 salute. 
 
 I am not good at descriptions of female beauty ; and, 
 indeed, do not care for it in the least (thinking that 
 goodness and virtue are, of course, far more advanta- 
 geous to a young lady than any mere fleeting charms of 
 person and face) , and so shall not attempt any particular 
 delineation of Miss Laura Bell at the age of sixteen 
 years. At that age she had attained her present altitude 
 of five feet four inches, so that she was called tall and 
 gawky by some, and a Maypole by others, of her own 
 sex, who prefer littler women. But if she was a May- 
 pole, she had beautiful roses about her head, and it is 
 a fact that many swains were disposed to dance round 
 her. She was ordinarily pale, with a faint rose tinge in 
 her cheeks ; but they flushed up in a minute when occa- 
 sion called, and continued so blushing ever so long, the 
 roses remaining after the emotion had passed away which 
 had summoned those pretty flowers into existence. Her 
 eyes have been described as very large from her earliest 
 childhood, and retained that characteristic in later life. 
 Good-natured critics (always females) said that she was 
 in the habit of making play with those eyes, and ogling 
 the gentlemen and ladies in her company; but the fact 
 is, that Nature had made them so to shine and to look, 
 and they could no more help so looking and shining than 
 one star can help being brighter than another. It was 
 doubtless to mitigate their brightness that Miss Laura's 
 eyes were provided with two pairs of veils in the shape 
 of the longest and finest black eyelashes, so that, when 
 she closed her eyes, the same people who found fault 
 with those orbs, said that she wanted to show her eye-
 
 314 PENDENNIS 
 
 lashes off; and, indeed, I dare say that to see her asleep 
 would have been a pretty sight. 
 
 As for her complexion, that was nearly as brilliant as 
 Lady Mantrap's, and without the powder which her 
 ladyship uses. Her nose must be left to the reader's 
 imagination: if her mouth was rather large (as Miss 
 Piminy avers, who, but for her known appetite, one 
 would think could not swallow anything larger than a 
 button) , everybody allowed that her smile was charming, 
 and showed off a set of pearly teeth, whilst her voice 
 was so low and sweet, that to hear it was like listening 
 to sweet music. Because she is in the habit of wearing 
 very long dresses, people of course say that her feet are 
 not small : but it may be, that they are of the size becom- 
 ing her figure, and it does not follow, because Mrs. 
 Pincher is always putting her foot out, that all other 
 ladies should be perpetually bringing theirs on the tapis. 
 In fine, Miss Laura Bell, at the age of sixteen, was a 
 sweet young lady. Many thousands of such are to be 
 found, let us hope, in this country, where there is no 
 lack of goodness, and modesty, and purity, and beauty. 
 
 Now, Miss Laura, since she had learned to think for 
 herself ( and in the past two years her mind and her per- 
 son had both developed themselves considerably), had 
 only been half pleased with Pen's general conduct and 
 bearing. His letters to his mother at home had become 
 of late very rare and short. It was in vain that the fond 
 widow urged how constant Arthur's occupations and 
 studies were, and how many his engagements. " It is 
 better that he should lose a prize," Laura said, " than for- 
 get his mother: and indeed, mamma, I don't see that he 
 gets many prizes. Why doesn't he come home and stay 
 with you, instead of passing his vacations at his great
 
 PENDENNIS 315 
 
 friends' fine houses? There is nobody there will love 
 him half as much as as you do." " As I do only, 
 Laura," sighed out Mrs. Pendennis. Laura declared 
 stoutly that she did not love Pen a bit, when he did not 
 do his duty to his mother: nor would she be convinced 
 by any of Helen's fond arguments, that the boy must 
 make his way in the world ; that his uncle was most de- 
 sirous that Pen should cultivate the acquaintance of 
 persons who were likely to befriend him in life ; that men 
 had a thousand ties and calls which women could not 
 understand, and so forth. Perhaps Helen no more be- 
 lieved in these excuses than her adopted daughter did; 
 but she tried to believe that she believed them, and com- 
 forted herself with the maternal infatuation. And that 
 is a point whereon I suppose many a gentleman has 
 reflected, that, do what we will, we are pretty sure of 
 the woman's love that once has been ours ; and that that 
 untiring tenderness and forgiveness never fail us. 
 
 Also, there had been that freedom, not to say audacity, 
 in Arthur's latter talk and ways, which had shocked and 
 displeased Laura. Not that he ever offended her by 
 rudeness, or addressed to her a word which she ought not 
 to hear, for Mr. Pen was a gentleman, and by nature 
 and education polite to every woman high and low; but 
 he spoke lightly and laxly of women in general; was 
 less courteous in his actions than in his words neglect- 
 ful in sundry ways, and in many of the little offices of 
 life. It offended Miss Laura that he should smoke his 
 horrid pipes in the house; that he should refuse to go 
 to church with his mother, or on walks or visits with her, 
 and be found yawning over his novel in his dressing- 
 gown, when the gentle widow returned from those duties. 
 The hero of Laura's early infancy, about whom she had
 
 316 PENDENNIS 
 
 passed so many, many nights talking with Helen (who 
 recited endless stories of the boy's virtues, and love, and 
 bravery, when he was away at school), was a very dif- 
 ferent person from the young man whom now she knew ; 
 bold and brilliant, sarcastic and defiant, seeming to scorn 
 the simple occupations or pleasures, or even devotions, 
 of the women with whom he lived, and whom he quitted 
 on such light pretexts. 
 
 The Fotheringay affair, too, when Laura came to 
 hear of it ( which she did first by some sarcastic allusions 
 of Major Pendennis, when on a visit to Fairoaks, and 
 then from their neighbours at Clavering, who had plenty 
 of information to give her on this head), vastly shocked 
 and outraged Miss Laura. A Pendennis fling himself 
 away on such a woman as that! Helen's boy galloping 
 away from home, day after day, to fall on his knees to 
 an actress, and drink with her horrid father! A good 
 son want to bring such a man and such a woman into 
 his house, and set her over his mother! " I would have 
 run away, mamma ; I would, if I had had to walk bare- 
 foot through the snow," Laura said. 
 
 " And you would have left me too, then? " Helen an- 
 swered; on which, of course, Laura withdrew her pre- 
 vious observation, and the two women rushed into each 
 other's embraces with that warmth which belonged to 
 both their natures, and which characterises not a few of 
 their sex. Whence came all this indignation of Miss 
 Laura about Arthur's passion? Perhaps she did not 
 know, that, if men throw themselves away upon women, 
 women throw themselves away upon men, too ; and that 
 there is no more accounting for love, than for any other 
 physical liking or antipathy: perhaps she had been mis- 
 informed by the Clavering people and old Mrs. Port-
 
 PENDENNIS 317 
 
 man, who was vastly bitter against Pen, especially since 
 his impertinent behaviour to the Doctor, and since the 
 wretch had smoked cigars in church-time: perhaps, 
 finally, she was jealous; but this is a vice in which it 
 is said the ladies very seldom indulge. 
 
 Albeit she was angry with Pen, against his mother she 
 had no such feeling; but devoted herself to Helen with 
 the utmost force of her girlish affection such affection 
 as women, whose hearts are disengaged, are apt to be- 
 stow upon the near female friend. It was devotion it 
 was passion it was all sorts of fondness and folly; it 
 was a profusion of caresses, tender epithets and endear- 
 ments, such as it does not become sober historians with 
 beards to narrate. Do not let us men despise these in- 
 stincts because we cannot feel them. These women were 
 made for our comfort and delectation, gentlemen, with 
 all the rest of the minor animals. 
 
 But as soon as Miss Laura heard that Pen was unfor- 
 tunate and unhappy, all her wrath against him straight- 
 way vanished, and gave place to the most tender and 
 unreasonable compassion. He was the Pen of old days 
 once more restored to her, the frank and affectionate, 
 the generous and tender-hearted. She at once took side 
 with Helen against Doctor Portman, when he outcried 
 at the enormity of Pen's transgressions. Debts? what 
 were his debts? they were a trifle; he had been thrown 
 into expensive society by his uncle's order, and of course 
 was obliged to live in the same manner as the young 
 gentlemen whose company he frequented. Disgraced 
 by not getting his degree? the poor boy was ill when he 
 went in for the examinations: he couldn't think of his 
 mathematics and stuff on account of those very debts 
 which oppressed him; very likely some of the odious
 
 318 PEXDENNIS 
 
 tutors and masters were jealous of him, and had favour- 
 ites of their own whom they wanted to put over his head. 
 Other people disliked him and were cruel to him, and 
 were unfair to him, she was very sure. And so, with 
 flushing cheeks and eyes bright with anger, this young 
 creature reasoned; and she went up and seized Helen's 
 hand, and kissed her in the Doctor's presence, and her 
 looks braved the Doctor, and seemed to ask how he 
 dared to say a word against her darling mother's Pen? 
 
 When that divine took his leave, not a little discom- 
 fited and amazed at the pertinacious obstinacy of the 
 women, Laura repeated her embraces and arguments 
 with tenfold fervour to Helen, who felt that there was 
 a great deal of cogency in most of the latter. There 
 must be some jealousy against Pen. She felt quite 
 sure that he had offended some of the examiners, who 
 had taken a mean revenge of him nothing more likely. 
 Altogether, the announcement of the misfortune vexed 
 these two ladies very little indeed. Pen, who was 
 plunged in his shame and grief in London, and torn with 
 great remorse for thinking of his mother's sorrow, would 
 have wondered, had he seen how easily she bore the 
 calamity. Indeed, calamity is welcome to women if they 
 think it will bring truant affection home again: and if 
 you have reduced your mistress to a crust, depend upon 
 it that she won't repine, and only take a very little bit 
 of it for herself, provided you will eat the remainder 
 in her company. 
 
 And directly the Doctor was gone, Laura ordered fires 
 to be lighted in Mr. Arthur's rooms, and his bedding to 
 be aired; and had these preparations completed by the 
 time Helen had finished a most tender and affectionate 
 letter to Pen: when the girl, smiling fondly, took her
 
 PENDENNIS 319 
 
 mamma by the hand, and led her into those apartments 
 where the fires were blazing so cheerfully, and there the 
 two kind creatures sate down on the bed, and talked 
 about Pen ever so long. Laura added a postscript to 
 Helen's letter, in which she called him her dearest Pen, 
 and bade him come home instantly , with two of the hand- 
 somest dashes under the word, and be happy with his 
 mother and his affectionate sister Laura. 
 
 In the middle of the night as these two ladies, after 
 reading their Bibles a great deal during the evening, and 
 after taking just a look into Pen's room as they passed 
 to their own in the middle of the night, I say, Laura, 
 whose head not unfrequently chose to occupy that pil- 
 low which the nightcap of the late Pendennis had been 
 accustomed to press, cried out suddenly, " Mamma, are 
 you awake? " 
 
 Helen stirred and said, " Yes, I'm awake." The truth 
 is, though she had been lying quite still and silent, she 
 had not been asleep one instant, but had been looking at 
 the night-lamp in the chimney, and had been thinking 
 of Pen for hours and hours. 
 
 Then Miss Laura (who had been acting with similar 
 hypocrisy, and lying, occupied with her own thoughts, 
 as motionless as Helen's brooch, with Pen's and Laura's 
 hair in it, on the frilled white pincushion on the dressing- 
 table) began to tell Mrs. Pendennis of a notable plan 
 which she had been forming in her busy little brains ; and 
 by which all Pen's embarrassments would be made to 
 vanish in a moment, and without the least trouble to 
 anybody. 
 
 * You know, mamma," this young lady said, " that I 
 have been living with you for ten years, during which 
 time you have never taken any of my money, and have
 
 320 PENDENNIS 
 
 been treating me just as if I was a charity girl. Now, 
 this obligation has offended me very much, because I am 
 proud and do not like to be beholden to people. And as, 
 if I had gone to school only I wouldn't it must have 
 cost me at least fifty pounds a year, it is clear that I owe 
 you fifty times ten pounds, which I know you have put 
 into the bank at Chatteris for me, and which doesn't 
 belong to me a bit. Now, to-morrow we will go to Chat- 
 teris, and see that nice old Mr. Rowdy, with the bald 
 head, and ask for it, not for his head, but for the 
 five hundred pounds: and I dare say he will lend you 
 two more, which we will save and pay back ; and we will 
 send the money to Pen, who can pay all his debts without 
 hurting anybody, and then we will live happy ever 
 after." 
 
 What Helen replied to this speech need not be re- 
 peated, as the widow's answer was made up of a great 
 number of incoherent ejaculations, embraces, and other 
 irrelative matter. But the two women slept well after 
 that talk; and when the night-lamp went out with a 
 splutter, and the sun rose gloriously over the purple hills, 
 and the birds began to sing and pipe cheerfully amidst 
 the leafless trees and glistening evergreens on Fairoaks 
 lawn, Helen woke too, and as she looked at the sweet 
 face of the girl sleeping beside her, her lips parted with 
 a smile, blushes on her cheeks, her spotless bosom heav- 
 ing and falling with gentle undulations, as if happy 
 dreams were sweeping over it Pen's mother felt happy 
 and grateful beyond all power of words, save such as 
 pious women offer up to the Beneficent Dispenser of 
 love and mercy in Whose honour a chorus of such 
 praises is constantly rising up all round the world. 
 
 Although it was January and rather cold weather, so 
 sincere was Mr. Pen's remorse, and so determined his
 
 PENDENNIS 321 
 
 plans of economy, that he would not take an inside place 
 in the coach, but sate up behind with his friend the 
 Guard, who remembered his former liberality, and lent 
 him plenty of great coats. Perhaps it was the cold that 
 made his knees tremble as he got down at the lodge gate, 
 or it may be that he was agitated at the notion of seeing 
 the kind creature for whose love he had made so selfish 
 a return. Old John was in waiting to receive his mas- 
 ter's baggage, but he appeared in a fustian jacket, and 
 no longer wore his livery of drab and blue. " I'se garner 
 and stable man, and lives in the ladge now," this worthy 
 man remarked, with a grin of welcome to Pen, and some- 
 thing of a blush ; but instantly as Pen turned the corner 
 of the shrubbery and was out of eye-shot of the coach, 
 Helen made her appearance, her face beaming with love 
 and forgiveness for forgiving is what some women 
 love best of all. 
 
 We may be sure that the widow, having a certain other 
 object in view, had lost no time in writing off to Pen 
 an account of the noble, the magnanimous, the magnifi- 
 cent offer of Laura, filling up her letter with a profu- 
 sion of benedictions upon both her children. It was 
 probably the knowledge of this money-obligation which 
 caused Pen to blush very much when he saw Laura, who 
 was in waiting in the hall, and who this time, and for 
 this time only, broke through the little arrangement of 
 which we have spoken, as having subsisted between her 
 and Arthur for the last few years ; but the truth is, there 
 has been a great deal too much said about kissing in the 
 present chapter. 
 
 So the Prodigal came home, and the fatted calf was 
 killed for him, and he was made as happy as two simple 
 women could make him. No allusions were made to the
 
 322 PENDENNIS 
 
 Oxbridge mishap, or questions asked as to his farther 
 proceedings, for some time. But Pen debated these anx- 
 iously in his own mind, and up in his own room, where 
 he passed much time in cogitation. 
 
 A few days after he came home, he rode to Chatteris 
 on his horse, and came back on the top of the coach. He 
 then informed his mother that he had left the horse to 
 be sold; and when that operation was effected, he 
 handed her over the cheque, which she, and possibly Pen 
 himself, thought was an act of uncommon virtue and 
 self-denial, but which Laura pronounced to be only strict 
 justice. 
 
 He rarely mentioned the loan which she had made, 
 and which, indeed, had been accepted by the widow with 
 certain modifications ; but once or twice, and with great 
 hesitation and stammering, he alluded to it, and thanked 
 her. It evidently pained his vanity to be beholden to 
 the orphan for succour. He was wild to find some means 
 of repaying her. 
 
 He left off drinking wine, and betook himself, but 
 with great moderation, to the refreshment of whisky- 
 and-water. He gave up cigar smoking ; but it must be 
 confessed that of late years he had liked pipes and to- 
 bacco as well or even better, so that this sacrifice was not 
 a very severe one. 
 
 He fell asleep a great deal after dinner when he joined 
 the ladies in the drawing-room, and was certainly very 
 moody and melancholy. He watched the coaches with 
 great interest, walked in to read the papers at Clavering 
 assiduously, dined with anybody who would ask him 
 ( and the widow was glad that he should have any enter- 
 tainment in their solitary place) , and played a good deal 
 at cribbage with Captain Glanders.
 
 PENDENNIS 323 
 
 He avoided Doctor Portman, who, in his turn, when- 
 ever Pen passed, gave him very severe looks from under 
 his shovel-hat. He went to church with his mother, how- 
 ever, very regularly, and read prayers for her at home to 
 the little household. Always humble, it was greatly 
 diminished now : a couple of maids did the work of the 
 house of Fairoaks: the silver dish-covers never saw the 
 light at all. John put on his livery to go to church, and 
 assert his dignity on Sundays, but it was only for form's 
 sake. He was gardener and out-door man, vice Up- 
 ton, resigned. There was but little fire in Fairoaks 
 kitchen, and John and the maids drank their evening 
 beer there by the light of a single candle. All this was 
 Mr. Pen's doing, and the state of things did not increase 
 his cheerfulness. 
 
 For some time Pen said no power on earth could in- 
 duce him to go back to Oxbridge again, after his failure 
 there; but one day, Laura said to him, with many 
 blushes, that she thought, as some sort of reparation, of 
 punishment on himself for his for his idleness, he 
 ought to go back and get his degree, if he could fetch it 
 by doing so; and so back Mr. Pen went. 
 
 A plucked man is a dismal being in a university; be- 
 longing to no set of men there, and owned by no one. 
 Pen felt himself plucked indeed of all the fine feathers 
 which he had won during his brilliant years, and rarely 
 appeared out of his college ; regularly going to morning 
 chapel, and shutting himself up in his rooms of nights, 
 away from the noise and suppers of the undergraduates. 
 There were no duns about his door, they were all paid 
 scarcely any cards were left there. The men of his 
 year had taken their degrees, and were gone. He went 
 into a second examination, and passed with perfect ease.
 
 824 PENDENNIS 
 
 He was somewhat more easy in his mind when he ap- 
 peared in his bachelor's gown. 
 
 On his way back from Oxbridge he paid a visit to 
 his uncle in London; but the old gentleman received 
 him with very cold looks, and would scarcely give him his 
 forefinger to shake. He called a second time, but Mor- 
 gan, the valet, said his master was from home. 
 
 Pen came back to Fairoaks, and to his books and .to 
 his idleness, and loneliness and despair. He commenced 
 several tragedies, and wrote many copies of verses of a 
 gloomy cast. He formed plans of reading and broke 
 them. He thought about enlisting about the Spanish 
 legion about a profession. He chafed against his cap- 
 tivity, and cursed the idleness which had caused it. Helen 
 said he was breaking his heart, and was sad to see his 
 prostration. As soon as they could afford it, he should 
 go abroad he should go to London he should be freed 
 from the dull society of two poor women. It was dull 
 very, certainly. The tender widow's habitual melan- 
 choly seemed to deepen into a sadder gloom ; and Laura 
 saw with alarm that the dear friend became every year 
 more languid and weary, and that her pale cheek grew 
 more wan.
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 NEW FACES 
 
 HE inmates of Fair- 
 oaks were drowsi- 
 ly pursuing this 
 humdrum existence, 
 while the great 
 house upon the hill, 
 on the other side of 
 the River Brawl, was 
 shaking off the 
 slumber in which it 
 had lain during the 
 lives of two genera- 
 . tions of masters, and 
 giving extraordinary signs of renewed liveliness. 
 
 Just about the time of Pen's little mishap, and when 
 he was so absorbed in the grief occasioned by that calam- 
 ity as to take no notice of events which befel persons 
 less interesting to himself than Arthur Pendennis, an 
 announcement appeared in the provincial journals which 
 caused no small sensation in the county at least, and in 
 all the towns, villages, halls and mansions, and parson- 
 ages for many miles round Clavering Park. At Clav- 
 ering Market ; at Cackleby Fair ; at Chatteris Sessions ; 
 on Gooseberry Green, as the squire's carriage met the 
 vicar's one-horse contrivance, and the inmates of both 
 vehicles stopped on the road t to talk; at Tinkleton 
 
 325
 
 326 PENDENNIS 
 
 Church gate, as the bell was tolling in the sunshine, and 
 the white smocks and scarlet cloaks came trooping over 
 the green common, to Sunday worship; in a hundred 
 societies round about the word was, that Clavering 
 Park was to be inhabited again. 
 
 Some five years before, the county papers had ad- 
 vertised the marriage at Florence, at the British Lega- 
 tion, of Francis Clavering, Esq., only son of Sir Francis 
 Clavering, Bart., of Clavering Park, with Jemima Au- 
 gusta, daughter of Samuel Snell, of Calcutta, Esq., and 
 widow of the late J. Amory, Esq. At that time the 
 legend in the county was that Clavering, who had been 
 ruined for many a year, had married a widow from India 
 with some money. Some of the county folks caught a 
 sight of the newly-married pair. The Kickleburys, trav- 
 elling in Italy, had seen them. Clavering occupied the 
 Poggi Palace at Florence, gave parties, and lived com- 
 fortablybut could never come to England. Another 
 year young Peregrine, of Cackleby, making a Long 
 Vacation tour, had fallen in with the Claverings occu- 
 pying Schloss Schinkenstein, on the Mummul See. At 
 Rome, at Lucca, at Nice, at the baths and gambling 
 places of the Rhine and Belgium, this worthy couple 
 might occasionally be heard of by the curious, and ru- 
 mours of them came, as it were by gusts, to Clavering's 
 ancestral place. 
 
 Their last place of abode was Paris, where they appear 
 to have lived in great fashion and splendour after the 
 news of the death of Samuel Snell, Esq., of Calcutta, 
 reached his orphan daughter in Europe. 
 
 Of Sir Francis Clavering's antecedents little can be 
 said that would be advantageous to that respected baro- 
 net. The son of an outlaw, living in a dismal old chateau
 
 PENDENNIS 327 
 
 near Bruges, this gentleman had made a feeble attempt 
 to start in life with a commission in a dragoon regiment, 
 and had broken down almost at the outset. Trans- 
 actions at the gambling-table had speedily effected his 
 ruin; after a couple of years in the army he had been 
 forced to sell out, had passed some time in Her Majes- 
 ty's prison of the Fleet, and had then shipped over to 
 Ostend to join the gouty exile, his father. And in Bel- 
 gium, France, and Germany, for some years this 
 decayed and abortive prodigal might be seen lurking 
 about billiard-rooms and watering-places, punting at 
 gambling-houses, dancing at boarding-house balls, and 
 riding steeple-chases on other folks' horses. 
 
 It was at a boarding-house at Lausanne, that Francis 
 Clavering made what he called the lucky coup of marry- 
 ing the widow Amory, very lately returned from Cal- 
 cutta. His father died soon after, by consequence of 
 whose demise his wife became Lady Clavering. The 
 title so delighted Mr. Snell of Calcutta, that he doubled 
 his daughter's allowance ; and, dying himself soon after, 
 left a fortune to her and her children, the amount of 
 which was, if not magnified by rumour, something very 
 splendid indeed. 
 
 Before this time there had been, not rumours unfa- 
 vourable to Lady Clavering's reputation, but unpleasant 
 impressions regarding her ladyship. The best English 
 people abroad were shy of making her acquaintance; 
 her manners were not the most refined; her origin was 
 lamentably low and doubtful. The retired East In- 
 dians, who are to be found in considerable force in most 
 of the continental towns frequented by English, spoke 
 with much scorn of the disreputable old lawyer and 
 indigo-smuggler her father, and- of Amory, her first hus-
 
 328 PENDENNIS 
 
 band, who had been mate of the Indiaman in which Miss 
 Snell came out to join her father at Calcutta. Neither 
 father nor daughter was in society at Calcutta, or had 
 ever been heard of at Government House. Old Sir 
 Jasper Rogers, who had been Chief Justice of Calcutta, 
 had once said to his wife, that he could tell a queer story 
 about Lady Clavering's first husband; but greatly to 
 Lady Rogers's disappointment, and that of the young 
 ladies his daughters, the old Judge could never be got 
 to reveal that mystery. 
 
 They were all, however, glad enough to go to Lady 
 Clavering's parties, when her ladyship took the Hotel 
 Bouilli in the Rue Crenelle at Paris, and blazed out in 
 the polite world there in the winter of 183 . The Fau- 
 bourg St. Germain took her up. Viscount Bagwig, our 
 excellent ambassador, paid her marked attention. The 
 princes of the family frequented her salons. The most 
 rigid and noted of the English ladies resident in the 
 French capital acknowledged and countenanced her ; the 
 virtuous Lady Elderbury, the severe Lady Rockminster, 
 the venerable Countess of Southdown people, in a 
 word, renowned for austerity, and of quite a dazzling 
 moral purity: so great and beneficent an influence had 
 the possession of ten (some said twenty) thousand-a- 
 year exercised upon Lady Clavering's character and rep- 
 utation. And her munificence and good-will were un- 
 bounded. Anybody (in society) who had a scheme of 
 charity was sure to find her purse open. The French 
 ladies of piety got money from her to support their 
 schools and convents; she subscribed indifferently for 
 the Armenian patriarch; for Father Barbarossa, who 
 came to Europe to collect funds for his monastery on 
 Mount Athos; for the Baptist Mission to Quashyboo,
 
 PENDENNIS 329 
 
 and the Orthodox Settlement in Feefawfoo, the largest 
 and most savage of the Cannibal Islands. And it is on 
 record of her, that, on the same day on which Madame 
 de Cricri got five Napoleons from her in support of the 
 poor persecuted Jesuits, who were at that time in very 
 bad odour in France, Lady Budelight put her down in 
 her subscription-list for the Rev. J. Ramshorn, who had 
 had a vision which ordered him to convert the Pope of 
 Rome. And more than this, and for the benefit of the 
 worldly, her ladyship gave the best dinners, and the 
 grandest balls and suppers, which were known at Paris 
 during that season. 
 
 And it was during this time, that the good-natured 
 lady must have arranged matters with her husband's 
 creditors in England, for Sir Francis re-appeared in his 
 native country, without fear of arrest; was announced 
 in the Morning Post, and the county paper, as having 
 taken up his residence at Mivart's Hotel; and one day 
 the anxious old housekeeper at Clavering House beheld 
 a carriage and four horses drive up the long avenue, and 
 stop before the moss-grown steps in front of the vast 
 melancholy portico. 
 
 Three gentlemen were in the carriage an open one. 
 On the back seat was our old acquaintance, Mr. Tatham 
 of Chatteris, whilst in the places of honour sate a hand- 
 some and portly gentleman enveloped in moustachios, 
 whiskers, fur collars, and braiding, and by him a pale 
 languid man, who descended feebly from the carriage, 
 when the little lawyer, and the gentleman in fur, had 
 nimbly jumped out of it. 
 
 They walked up the great moss-grown steps to the 
 hall-door, and a foreign attendant, with ear-rings and a 
 gold-laced cap, pulled strenuously at the great bell-han-
 
 330 PENDENNIS 
 
 die at the cracked and sculptured gate. The bell was 
 heard clanging loudly through the vast gloomy mansion. 
 Steps resounded presently upon the marble pavement 
 of the hall within; and the doors opened, and finally, 
 Mrs. Blenkinsop, the housekeeper, Polly, her aide-de- 
 camp, and Smart, the keeper, appeared bowing humbly. 
 
 Smart, the keeper, pulled the wisp of hay-coloured 
 hair which adorned his sunburnt forehead, kicked out 
 his left heel, as if there were a dog biting at his calves, 
 and brought down his head to a bow. Old Mrs. Blen- 
 kinsop dropped a curtsey. Little Polly, her aide-de- 
 camp, made a curtsey, and several rapid bows likewise: 
 and Mrs. Blenkinsop, with a great deal of emotion, qua- 
 vered out, " Welcome to Clavering, Sir Francis. It du 
 my poor eyes good to see one of the family once more." 
 
 The speech and the greetings were all addressed to 
 the grand gentleman in fur and braiding, who wore his 
 hat so magnificently on one side, and twirled his mousta- 
 chios so royally. But he burst out laughing, and said, 
 ' You've saddled the wrong horse, old lady I'm not 
 Sir Francis Clavering what's come to revisit the halls 
 of my ancestors. Friends and vassals! behold your 
 rightful lord!" 
 
 And he pointed his hand towards the pale, languid 
 gentleman, who said, " Don't be an ass, Ned." 
 
 ' Yes, Mrs. Blenkinsop, I'm Sir Francis Clavering; 
 I recollect you quite well. Forgot me, I suppose? How 
 dy do? " and he took the old lady's trembling hand; and 
 nodded in her astonished face, in a not unkind manner. 
 
 Mrs. Blenkinsop declared upon her conscience that 
 she would have known Sir Francis anywhere; that he 
 was the very image of Sir Francis his father, and of 
 Sir John who had gone before.
 
 PENDENNIS 331 
 
 " O yes thanky of course very much obliged 
 and that sort of thing," Sir Francis said, looking va- 
 cantly about the hall. " Dismal old place, ain't it, Ned? 
 Never saw it but once, when my governor quarrelled 
 with my gwandfather, in the year twenty-thwee." 
 
 "Dismal? beautiful! the Castle of Otranto! the 
 Mysteries of Udolpho, by Jove ! " said the individual 
 addressed as Ned. 'What a fire-place! You might 
 roast an elephant in it. Splendid carved gallery! In- 
 igo Jones, by Jove ! I'd lay five to two it's Inigo Jones." 
 ' The upper part by Inigo Jones; the lower was 
 altered by the eminent Dutch architect, Vanderputty, in 
 George the First his time, by Sir Richard, fourth baro- 
 net," said the housekeeper. 
 
 " O indeed," said the Baronet. ' 'Gad, Ned, you 
 know everything." 
 
 " I know a few things, Frank," Ned answered. " I 
 know that's not a Snyders over the mantel-piece bet 
 you three to one it's a copy. We'll restore it, my boy. 
 A lick of varnish, and it will come out wonderfully, sir. 
 That old fellow in the red gown, I suppose, is Sir 
 Richard." 
 
 " Sheriff of the county, and sate in parliament in the 
 reign of Queen Anne," said the housekeeper, wondering 
 at the stranger's knowledge; " that on the right is Theo- 
 dosia, wife of Harbottle, second baronet, by Lely, repre- 
 sented in the character of Venus, the Goddess of Beauty, 
 her son Gregory, the third baronet, by her side, as 
 Cupid, God of Love, with a bow and arrows; that on 
 the next panel is Sir Rupert, made a knight banneret 
 by Charles the First, and whose property was confus- 
 cated by Oliver Cromwell." 
 
 ' Thank you needn't go on-, Mrs. Blenkinsop," said
 
 332 PENDENNIS 
 
 the Baronet. ' We'll walk about the place ourselves. 
 Frosch, give me a cigar. Have a cigar, Mr. Tatham? " 
 
 Little Mr. Tatham tried a cigar which Sir Francis's 
 courier handed to him, and over which the lawyer splut- 
 tered fearfully. " Needn't come with us, Mrs. Blenkin- 
 sop. What's-his-name you Smart feed the horses 
 and wash their mouths. Shan't stay long. Come along, 
 Strong, I know the way: I was here in twenty-thwee, 
 at the end of my gwandfather's time." And Sir Francis 
 and Captain Strong, for such was the style and title of 
 Sir Francis's friend, passed out of the hall into the re- 
 ception-rooms, leaving the discomfited Mrs. Blenkinsop 
 to disappear by a side-door which led to her apartments, 
 now the only habitable rooms in the long-uninhabited 
 mansion. 
 
 It was a place so big that no tenant could afford to 
 live in it ; and Sir Francis and his friend walked through 
 room after room, admiring their vastness and dreary and 
 deserted grandeur. On the right of the hall door were 
 the saloons and drawing-rooms, and on the other side 
 the oak room, the parlour, the grand dining-room, the 
 library, where Pen had found books in old days. Round 
 three sides of the hall ran a gallery, by which, and cor- 
 responding passages, the chief bed-rooms were ap- 
 proached, and of which many were of stately propor- 
 tions and exhibited marks of splendour. On the second 
 story was a labyrinth of little discomfortable garrets, 
 destined for the attendants of the great folks who in- 
 habited the mansion in the days when it was first built: 
 and I do not know any more cheering mark of the in- 
 creased philanthropy of our own times, than to contrast 
 our domestic architecture with that of our ancestors, and 
 to see how much better servants and poor are cared for
 
 PENDENNIS 333 
 
 at present, than in times when my lord and my lady 
 slept under gold canopies, and their servants lay above 
 them in quarters not so airy or so clean as stables are 
 now. 
 
 Up and down the house the two gentlemen wandered, 
 the owner of the mansion being very silent and resigned 
 about the pleasure of possessing it; whereas the Cap- 
 tain, his friend, examined the premises with so much 
 interest and eagerness that you would have thought 
 he was the master, and the other the indifferent spec- 
 tator of the place. " I see capabilities in it capabili- 
 ties in it, sir," cried the Captain. " Gad, sir, leave it 
 to me, and I'll make it the pride of the country, at 
 a small expense. What a theatre we can have in the 
 library here, the curtains between the columns which 
 divide the room! What a famous room for a galop! 
 it will hold the whole shire. We'll hang the morn- 
 ing parlour with the tapestry in your second salon 
 in the Rue de Crenelle, and furnish the oak room with 
 the Moyen-age cabinets and the armour. Armour looks 
 splendid against black oak, and there's a Venice glass 
 in the Quai Voltaire, which will suit that high mantel- 
 piece to an inch, sir. The long saloon, white and crim- 
 son, of course ; the drawing-room yellow satin ; and the 
 little drawing-room light blue, with lace over hey? " 
 
 " I recollect my old governor caning me in that little 
 room," Sir Francis said sententiously ; " he always hated 
 me, my old governor." 
 
 " Chintz is the dodge, I suppose, for my lady's rooms 
 the suite in the landing, to the south, the bed-room, the 
 sitting-room, and the dressing-room. We'll throw a con- 
 servatory out, over the balcony. Where will you have 
 your rooms? "
 
 334 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Put mine in the north wing," said the Baronet, with 
 a yawn, " and out of the reach of Miss Amory's con- 
 founded piano. I can't bear it. She's scweeching from 
 morning till night." 
 
 The Captain burst out laughing. He settled the 
 whole further arrangements of the house in the course of 
 their walk through it; and, the promenade ended, they 
 went into the steward's room, now inhabited by Mrs. 
 Blenkinsop, and where Mr. Tatham was sitting poring 
 over a plan of the estate, and the old housekeeper had 
 prepared a collation in honour of her lord and master. 
 
 Then they inspected the kitchen and stables, about 
 both of which Sir Francis was rather interested, and 
 Captain Strong was for examining the gardens; but 
 the baronet said, " D the gardens, and that sort of 
 thing! " and finally he drove away from the house as 
 unconcernedly as he had entered it; and that night the 
 people of Clavering learned that Sir Francis Clavering 
 had paid a visit to the Park, and was coming to live in 
 the county. 
 
 When this fact came to be known at Chatteris, all 
 the folks in the place were set in commotion: High 
 Church and Low Church, half-pay captains and old 
 maids and dowagers, sporting squireens of the vicinage, 
 farmers, tradesmen, and factory people all the popu- 
 lation in and round about the little place. The news was 
 brought to Fairoaks, and received by the ladies there, 
 and by Mr. Pen, with some excitement. " Mrs. Pybus 
 says there is a very pretty girl in the family, Arthur," 
 Laura said, who was as kind and thoughtful upon this 
 point as women generally are : " a Miss Amory, Lady 
 Clavering's daughter by her first marriage. Of course, 
 you'll fall in love with her as soon as she arrives."
 
 PENDENNIS 335 
 
 Helen cried out, " Don't talk nonsense, Laura." Pen 
 laughed, and said, " Well, there is the young Sir Francis 
 for you." 
 
 " He is but four years old," Miss Laura replied. 
 "But I shall console myself with that handsome officer, 
 Sir Francis's friend. He was at church last Sunday, in 
 the Clavering pew, and his moustachios were beautiful." 
 
 Indeed the number of Sir Francis's family (whereof 
 the members have all been mentioned in the above para- 
 graphs) was pretty soon known in the town, and every- 
 thing else, as nearly as human industry and ingenuity 
 could calculate, regarding his household. The Park 
 avenue and grounds were dotted now with town folks 
 of the summer evenings, who made their way up to the 
 great house, peered about the premises, and criticised 
 the improvements which were taking place there. Loads 
 upon loads of furniture arrived in numberless vans from 
 Chatteris and London; and numerous as the vans were, 
 there was not one but Captain Glanders knew what it 
 contained, and escorted the baggage up to the Park 
 House. 
 
 He and Captain Edward Strong had formed an in- 
 timate acquaintance by this time. The younger Cap- 
 tain occupied those very lodgings at Clavering, which 
 the peaceful Smirke had previously tenanted, and was 
 deep in the good graces of Madame Fribsby, his land- 
 lady ; and of the whole town, indeed. The Captain was 
 splendid in person and raiment; fresh -coloured, blue- 
 eyed, black -whiskered, broad-chested, athletic a slight 
 tendency to fulness did not take away from the comeli- 
 ness of his jolly figure a braver soldier never presented 
 a broader chest to the enemy. As he strode down Clav- 
 ering High Street, his hat on one side, his cane clank-
 
 336 PENDENNIS 
 
 ing on the pavement, or waving round him in the execu- 
 tion of military cuts and soldatesque manoeuvres his 
 jolly laughter ringing through the otherwise silent street 
 he was as welcome as sunshine to the place, and a 
 comfort to every inhabitant in it. 
 
 On the first market-day he knew every pretty girl in 
 the market: he joked with all the women; had a word 
 with the farmers about their stock, and dined at the 
 Agricultural Ordinary at the Clavering Arms, where he 
 set them all dying with laughter by his fun and jokes. 
 ' Tu be sure he be a vine feller, tu be sure that he be," 
 was the universal opinion of the gentlemen in top-boots. 
 He shook hands with a score of them, as they rode out 
 of the inn-yard on their old nags, waving his hat to them 
 splendidly as he smoked his cigar in the inn-gate. In 
 the course of the evening he was free of the landlady's 
 bar, knew what rent the landlord paid, how many acres 
 he farmed, how much malt he put in his strong beer ; and 
 whether he ever run in a little brandy unexcised by 
 kings from Baymouth, or the fishing villages along 
 the coast. 
 
 He had tried to live at the great house first ; but it was 
 so dull he couldn't stand it. 'I am a creature born for 
 society," he told Captain Glanders. "I'm down here 
 to see Clavering's house set in order; for between our- 
 selves, Frank has no energy, sir, no energy; he's not 
 the chest for it, sir (and he threw out his own trunk as 
 he spoke) ; but I must have social intercourse. Old 
 Mrs. Blenkinsop goes to bed at seven, and takes Polly 
 with her. There was nobody but me and the Ghost for 
 the first two nights at the great house, and I own it, sir, 
 I like company. Most old soldiers do." 
 
 Glanders asked Strong where he had served? Cap-
 
 PENDENNIS 337 
 
 tain Strong curled his moustache, and said with a laugh, 
 that the other might almost ask where he had not served. 
 " I began, sir, as cadet of Hungarian Uhlans, and when 
 the war of Greek independence broke out, quitted that 
 service in consequence of a quarrel with my governor, 
 and was one of the seven who escaped from Missolonghi, 
 and was blown up in one of Botzaris's fireships, at the 
 age of seventeen. I'll show you my Cross of the Re- 
 deemer, if you'll come over to my lodgings and take a 
 glass of grog with me, Captain, this evening. I've a 
 few of those baubles in my desk. I've the White Eagle 
 of Poland; Skrzynecki gave it me" (he pronounced 
 Skrzynecki's name with wonderful accuracy and gusto) 
 " upon the field of Ostrolenko. I was a lieutenant of 
 the fourth regiment, sir, and we marched through Die- 
 bitsch's lines bang thro' 'em into Prussia, sir, without 
 firing a shot. Ah, Captain, that was a mismanaged 
 business. I received this wound by the side of the King 
 before Oporto where he would have pounded the stock- 
 jobbing Pedroites, had Bourmont followed my advice; 
 and I served in Spain with the King's troops, until the 
 death of my dear friend, Zumalacarreguy, when I saw 
 the game was over, and hung up my toasting-iron, Cap- 
 tain. Alava offered me a regiment; but I couldn't 
 damme, I couldn't and now, sir, you know Ned Strong 
 the Chevalier Strong they call me abroad as well as 
 he knows himself." 
 
 In this way almost everybody in Clavering came to 
 know Ned Strong. He told Madame Fribsby, he told 
 the landlord of the George, he told Baker at the reading- 
 rooms, he told Mrs. Glanders, and the young ones, at 
 dinner : and finally, he told Mr. Arthur Pendennis, who, 
 yawning into Clavering one day, found the Chevalier
 
 338 PENDENNIS 
 
 Strong in company with Captain Glanders; and who 
 was delighted with his new acquaintance. 
 
 Before many days were over, Captain Strong was as 
 much at home in Helen's drawing-room as he was in 
 Madame Fribsby's first floor ; and made the lonely house 
 very gay with his good humour and ceaseless flow of 
 talk. The two women had never before seen such a 
 man. He had a thousand stories about battles and dan- 
 gers to interest them about Greek captives, Polish 
 beauties, and Spanish nuns. He could sing scores of 
 songs, in half-a-dozen languages, and would sit down 
 to the piano and troll them off in a rich manly voice. 
 Both the ladies pronounced him to be delightful and 
 so he was : though, indeed, they had not had much choice 
 of man's society as yet, having seen in the course of their 
 lives but few persons, except old Portman and the Ma- 
 jor, and Mr. Pen, who was a genius, to be sure; but then 
 your geniuses are somewhat flat and moody at home. 
 
 And Captain Strong acquainted his new friends at 
 Fairoaks, not only with his own biography, but with 
 the whole history of the family now coming to Claver- 
 ing. It was he who had made the marriage between his 
 friend Frank and the widow Amory. She wanted rank, 
 and he wanted money. What match could be more suit- 
 able? He organised it; he made those two people 
 happy. There was no particular romantic attachment 
 between them; the widow was not of an age or a per- 
 son for romance, and Sir Francis, if he had his game 
 at billiards, and his dinner, cared for little besides. But 
 they were as happy as people could be. Clavering would 
 return to his native place and country, his wife's fortune 
 would pay his encumbrances off, and his son and heir 
 would be one of the first men in the county.
 
 PENDENNIS 339 
 
 " And Miss Amory? " Laura asked. Laura was un- 
 commonly curious about Miss Amory. 
 
 Strong laughed. " Oh, Miss Amory is a muse Miss 
 Amory is a mystery Miss Amory is a femme incom- 
 r prise" ' What is that? " asked simple Mrs. Pendennis 
 but the Chevalier gave her no answer; perhaps could 
 not give her one. " Miss Amory paints, Miss Amory 
 writes poems, Miss Amory composes music, Miss Amory 
 rides like Diana Vernon. Miss Amory is a paragon, 
 in a word." 
 
 " I hate clever women," said Pen. 
 
 ' Thank you," said Laura. For her part she was sure 
 she should be charmed with Miss Amory, and quite 
 longed to have such a friend. And with this she looked 
 Pen full in the face, as if every word the little hypocrite 
 said was Gospel truth. 
 
 Thus an intimacy was arranged and prepared before- 
 hand between the Fairoaks family and their wealthy 
 neighbours at the Park; and Pen and Laura were to 
 the full as eager for their arrival, as even the most curi- 
 ous of the Clavering folks. A Londoner, who sees fresh 
 faces and yawns at them every day, may smile at the 
 eagerness with which country people expect a visitor. 
 A cockney comes amongst them, and is remembered 
 by his rural entertainers for years after he has left them, 
 and forgotten them very likely floated far away from 
 them on the vast London sea. But the islanders remem- 
 ber long after the mariner has sailed away, and can tell 
 you what he said and what he wore, and how he looked 
 and how he laughed. In fine, a new arrival is an event 
 in the country not to be understood by us, who don't, 
 and had rather not, know who lives next door. 
 
 When the painters and upholsterers had done their
 
 340 PENDENNIS 
 
 work in the house, and so beautified it, under Captain 
 Strong's superintendence, that he might well be proud 
 of his taste, that gentleman announced that he should 
 go to London, where the whole family had arrived by 
 this time, and should speedily return to establish them 
 in their renovated mansion. 
 
 Detachments of domestics preceded them. Carriages 
 came down by sea, and were brought over from Bay- 
 mouth by horses which had previously arrived under the 
 care of grooms and coachmen. One day the " Alacrity " 
 coach brought down on its roof two large and melancholy 
 men, who were dropped at the Park lodge with their 
 trunks, and who were Messieurs Frederic and James, 
 metropolitan footmen, who had no objection to the coun- 
 try, and brought with them state and other suits of the 
 Clavering uniform. 
 
 On another day, the mail deposited at the gate a for- 
 eign gentleman, adorned with many ringlets and chains. 
 He made a great riot at the lodge gate to the keeper's 
 wife (who, being a West country woman, did not under- 
 stand his English or his Gascon French ) , because there 
 was no carriage in waiting to drive him to the house, a 
 mile off, and because he could not walk entire leagues 
 in his fatigued state and varnished boots. This was 
 Monsieur Alcide Mirobolant, formerly Chef of his 
 Highness the Due de Borodino, of H. Eminence Cardi- 
 nal Beccafico, and at present Chef of the bouche of Sir 
 Clavering, Baronet: Monsieur Mirobolant's library, 
 pictures, and piano, had arrived previously in charge 
 of the intelligent young Englishman, his aide-de-camp. 
 He was, moreover, aided by a professed female cook, 
 likewise from London, who had inferior females under 
 her orders.
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 341 
 
 He did not dine in the steward's room, but took his 
 nutriment in solitude in his own apartments, where a 
 
 female servant was affected to his private use. It was 
 a grand sight to behold him in his dressing-gown com- 
 posing a menu. He always sate down and played the 
 piano for some time before. If interrupted, he remon- 
 strated pathetically. Every great artist, he said, had 
 need of solitude to perfectionate his works. 
 
 But we are advancing matters in the fulness of our
 
 342 PENDENNIS 
 
 love and respect for Monsieur Mirobolant, and bringing 
 him prematurely on the stage. 
 
 The Chevalier Strong had a hand in the engagement 
 of all the London domestics, and, indeed, seemed to be 
 the master of the house. There were those among them 
 who said he was the house-steward, only he dined with 
 the family. Howbeit, he knew how to make himself 
 respected, and two of by no means the least comforta- 
 ble rooms of the house were assigned to his particular 
 use. 
 
 He was walking upon the terrace finally upon the 
 eventful day, when, amidst an immense jangling of bells 
 from Clavering Church, where the flag was flying, an 
 open carriage and one of those travelling chariots or 
 family arks, which only English philo-progenitiveness 
 could invent, drove rapidly with foaming horses through 
 the Park gates, and up to the steps of the Hall. The 
 two battans of the sculptured door flew open. Two su- 
 perior officers in black, the large and melancholy gen- 
 tlemen, now in livery with their hair in powder, the 
 country menials engaged to aid them, were in waiting 
 in the hall, and bowed like tall elms when autumn winds 
 wail in the park. Through this avenue passed Sir Fran- 
 cis Clavering with a most unmoved face: Lady Clav- 
 ering, with a pair of bright black eyes, and a good- 
 humoured countenance, which waggled and nodded very 
 graciously: Master Francis Clavering, who was holding 
 his mamma's skirt (and who stopped the procession to 
 look at the largest footman, whose appearance seemed 
 to strike the young gentleman ) , and Miss Blandy, gov- 
 erness to Master Francis, and Miss Amory, her lady- 
 ship's daughter, giving her arm to Captain Strong. It 
 was summer, but fires of welcome were crackling in the
 
 PENDENNIS 343 
 
 great hall chimney, and in the rooms which the family 
 were to occupy. 
 
 Monsieur Mirobolant had looked at the procession 
 from one of the lime-trees in the avenue. " Elle est la," 
 he said, laying his jewelled hand on his richly-embroid- 
 ered velvet waiscoat with glass buttons, " Je t'ai vue; 
 je te benis, O ma sylphide, O mon ange! " and he dived 
 into the thicket, and made his way back to his furnaces 
 and saucepans. 
 
 The next Sunday the same party which had just 
 made its appearance at Clavering Park, came and pub- 
 licly took possession of the ancient pew in the church, 
 where so many of the baronet's ancestors had prayed, 
 and were now kneeling in effigy. There was such a run 
 to see the new folks, that the Low Church was deserted, 
 to the disgust of its pastor; and as the state barouche, 
 with the greys and coachman in silver wig, and solemn 
 footmen, drew up at the old church-yard gate, there was 
 such a crowd assembled there as had not been seen for 
 many a long day. Captain Strong knew everybody, and 
 saluted for all the company. The country people vowed 
 my lady was not handsome, to be sure, but pronounced 
 her to be uncommon fine dressed, as indeed she was 
 with the finest of shawls, the finest of pelisses, the bril- 
 liantest of bonnets and wreaths, and a power of rings, 
 cameos, brooches, chains, bangles, and other nameless 
 gimcracks; and ribbons of every breadth and colour of 
 the rainbow flaming on her person. Miss Amory ap- 
 peared meek in dove-colour, like a vestal virgin while 
 Master Francis was in the costume then prevalent of 
 Rob Roy Macgregor, a celebrated Highland outlaw. 
 The baronet was not more animated than ordinarily 
 there was a happy vacuity about him which enabled him
 
 344 PENDENNIS 
 
 to face a dinner, a death, a church, a marriage, with the 
 same indifferent ease. 
 
 A pew for the Clavering servants was filled by these 
 domestics, and the enraptured congregation saw the gen- 
 tlemen from London with " vlower on their heeds," and 
 the miraculous coachman with his silver wig, take their 
 places in that pew so soon as his horses were put up at 
 the Clavering Arms. 
 
 In the course of the service, Master Francis began to 
 make such a yelling in the pew, that Frederic, the tall- 
 est of the footmen, was beckoned by his master, and rose 
 and went and carried out Master Francis, who roared 
 and beat him on the head, so that the powder flew round 
 about, like clouds of incense. Nor was he pacified until 
 placed on the box of the carriage, where he played at 
 horses with John's whip. 
 
 ' You see the little beggar's never been to church be- 
 fore, Miss Bell," the baronet drawled out to a young lady 
 who was visiting him; "no wonder he should make a row: 
 I don't go in town neither, but I think it's right in the 
 country to give a good example and that sort of thing." 
 
 Miss Bell laughed and said, " The little boy had not 
 given a particularly good example." 
 
 " Gad, I don't know," said the baronet. ; ' It ain't so 
 bad neither. Whenever he wants a thing, Frank always 
 cwies, and whenever he cwies he gets it." 
 
 Here the child in question began to howl for a dish of 
 sweetmeats on the luncheon table, and making a lunge 
 across the table-cloth, upset a glass of wine over the best 
 waistcoat of one of the guests present, Mr. Arthur Pen- 
 dennis, who was greatly annoyed at being made to look 
 foolish; and at having his spotless cambric shirt front 
 blotched with wine.
 
 Master Francis in a 
 state of revolt
 
 PENDENNIS 345 
 
 " We do spoil him so," said Lady Clavering to Mrs. 
 Pendennis, fondly gazing at the cherub, whose hands 
 and face were now frothed over with the species of lather 
 which is inserted in the confection called meringues a la 
 creme. 
 
 " Gad, I was quite wight," said the baronet. " He has 
 cwied, and he has got it, you see. Go it, Fwank, old 
 boy." 
 
 " Sir Francis is a very judicious parent," Miss Amory 
 whispered. " Don't you think so, Miss Bell? I shan't 
 call you Miss Bell I shall call you Laura. I admired 
 you so at church. Your robe was not well made, nor 
 your bonnet very fresh. But you have such beautiful 
 grey eyes, and such a lovely tint." 
 
 " Thank you," said Miss Bell, laughing. 
 
 " Your cousin is handsome, and thinks so. He is un- 
 easy de sa personne. He has not seen the world yet. 
 Has he genius? Has he suffered? A lady, a little 
 woman in a rumpled satin and velvet shoes a Miss 
 Pybus came here, and said he has suffered. I, too, 
 have suffered, and you, Laura, has your heart ever 
 been touched? " 
 
 Laura said " No! " but perhaps blushed a little at the 
 idea or the question, so that the other said, 
 
 "Ah, Laura! I see it all. It is the beau cousin. Tell 
 me everything. I already love you as a sister." 
 
 * You are very kind," said Miss Bell, smiling, " and 
 and it must be owned that it is a very sudden attach- 
 ment." 
 
 " All attachments are so. It is electricity sponta- 
 neity. It is instantaneous. I knew I should love you 
 from the moment I saw you. Do you not feel it your- 
 self?"
 
 346 PENDENNlS 
 
 " Not yet," said Laura; " but I dare say I shall if I 
 try." 
 
 " Call me by my name, then." 
 
 " But I don't know it," Laura cried out. 
 
 " My name is Blanche isn't it a pretty name? Call 
 me by it." 
 
 " Blanche it is very pretty, indeed." 
 
 " And while mamma talks with that kind-looking lady 
 what relation is she to you? She must have been 
 pretty once, but is rather passee; she is not well gantee, 
 but she has a pretty hand and while mamma talks to 
 her, come with me to my own room, my own, own room. 
 It's a darling room, though that horrid creature, Captain 
 Strong, did arrange it. Are you epris of him? He says 
 you are, but I know better ; it is the beau cousin. Yes 
 il a de beaux yeux. Je naime pas les blonds, ordinaire- 
 ment. Car je suis blonde moije suis Blanche et 
 blonde," and she looked at her face and made a moue 
 in the glass; and never stopped for Laura's answer to 
 the questions which she had put. 
 
 Blanche was fair, and like a sylph. She had fair 
 hair, with green reflections in it. But she had dark 
 eyebrows. She had long black eyelashes, which veiled 
 beautiful brown eyes. She had such a slim waist, that 
 it was a wonder to behold ; and such slim little feet, that 
 you would have thought the grass would hardly bend 
 under them. Her lips were of the colour of faint rose- 
 buds, and her voice warbled limpidly over a set of the 
 sweetest little pearly teeth ever seen. She showed them 
 very often, for they were very pretty. She was always 
 smiling, and a smile not only showed her teeth wonder- 
 fully, but likewise exhibited two lovely little pink 
 dimples, that nestled in either cheek.
 
 PENDENNIS 347 
 
 She showed Laura her drawings, which the other 
 thought charming. She played her some of her waltzes, 
 with a rapid and brilliant finger, and Laura was still 
 more charmed. And she then read her some poems, in 
 French and English, likewise of her own composition, 
 and which she kept locked in her own book her own 
 dear little book ; it was bound in blue velvet, with a gilt 
 lock, and on it was printed in gold the title of " Mes 
 Larmes." 
 
 " Mes Larmes! isn't it a pretty name? " the young 
 lady continued, who was pleased with everything that 
 she did, and did everything very well. Laura owned 
 that it was. She had never seen anything like it before ; 
 anything so lovely, so accomplished, so fragile and 
 pretty; warbling so prettily, and tripping about such 
 a pretty room, with such a number of pretty books, pic- 
 tures, flowers, round about her. The honest and gen- 
 erous country girl forgot even jealousy in her admira- 
 tion. " Indeed, Blanche," she said, " everything in the 
 room is pretty; and you are the prettiest of all." The 
 other smiled, looked in the glass, went up and took both 
 of Laura's hands, and kissed them, and sat down to 
 the piano, and shook out a little song. 
 
 The intimacy between the young ladies sprang up 
 like Jack's Bean-stalk to the skies in a single night. The 
 large footmen were perpetually walking with little pink 
 notes to Fairoaks; where there was a pretty housemaid 
 in the kitchen, who might possibly tempt those gentle- 
 men to so humble a place. Miss Amory sent music, or 
 Miss Amory sent a new novel, or a picture from the 
 "Journal des Modes," to Laura; or my lady's com- 
 pliments arrived with flowers and fruit ; or Miss Amory 
 begged and prayed Miss Bell to come to dinner; and
 
 348 PENDENNIS 
 
 dear Mrs. Pendennis, if she was strong enough; and 
 Mr. Arthur, if a humdrum party were not too stupid 
 for him; and would send a pony-carriage for Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis; and would take no denial. 
 
 Neither Arthur nor Laura wished to refuse. And 
 Helen, who was, indeed, somewhat ailing, was glad that 
 the two should have their pleasure; and would look 
 at them fondly as they set forth, and ask in her heart 
 that she might not be called away until those two beings 
 whom she loved best in the world should be joined to- 
 gether. As they went out and crossed over the bridge, 
 she remembered summer evenings five-and-twenty years 
 ago, when she, too, had bloomed in her brief prime of love 
 and happiness. It was all over now. The moon was 
 looking from the purpling sky, and the stars glittering 
 there, just as they used in the early well-remembered 
 evenings. He was lying dead far away, with the bil- 
 lows rolling between them. Good God! how well she 
 remembered the last look of his face as they parted. 
 It looked out at her through the vista of long years, as 
 sad and as clear as then. 
 
 So Mr. Pen and Miss Laura found the society at 
 Clavering Park an uncommonly agreeable resort of sum- 
 mer evenings. Blanche vowed that she raffoled of 
 Laura; and, very likely, Mr. Pen was pleased with 
 Blanche. His spirits came back : he laughed and rattled 
 till Laura wondered to hear him. It was not the same 
 Pen, yawning in a shooting- jacket, in the Fairoaks 
 parlour, who appeared alert and brisk, and smiling, and 
 well dressed, in Lady Clavering's drawing-room. Some- 
 times they had music. Laura had a sweet contralto 
 voice, and sang with Blanche, who had had the best of
 
 Mr. Pea begins 
 to be consoled
 
 PENDENNIS 349 
 
 continental instruction, and was charmed to be her 
 friend's mistress. Sometimes Mr. Pen joined in these 
 concerts, or oftener looked sweet upon Miss Blanche as 
 she sang. Sometimes they had glees, when Captain 
 Strong's chest was of vast service, and he boomed out 
 in a prodigious bass, of which he was not a little proud. 
 
 "Good fellow, Strong ain't he, Miss Bell?" Sir 
 Francis would say to her. " Plays at ecarte with Lady 
 Clavering plays anything, pitch and toss, pianoforty, 
 cwibbage if you like. How long do you think he's been 
 staying with me? He came for a week with a carpet- 
 bag, and gad, he's been staying thwee years. Good fel- 
 low, ain't he ? Don't know how he gets a shillin', though, 
 by Jove I don't, Miss Lauwa." 
 
 And yet the Chevalier, if he lost his money to Lady 
 Clavering, always paid it ; and if he lived with his friend 
 for three years, paid for that too in good humour, in 
 kindness and joviality, in a thousand little services by 
 which he made himself agreeable. What gentleman 
 could want a better friend than a man who was always 
 in spirits, never in the way or out of it, and was ready 
 to execute any commission for his patron, whether it 
 was to sing a song or meet a lawyer, to fight a duel, or 
 to carve a capon? 
 
 Although Laura and Pen commonly went to Claver- 
 ing Park together, yet sometimes Mr. Pen took walks 
 there unattended by her, and about which he did not 
 tell her. He took to fishing the Brawl, which runs 
 through the Park, and passes not very far from the gar- 
 den-wall; and by the oddest coincidence, Miss Amory 
 would walk out (having been to look at her flowers) , and 
 would be quite surprised to see Mr. Pendennis fishing. 
 
 I wonder what trout Pen caught while the young lady
 
 350 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 was looking on? or whether Miss Blanche was the pretty 
 little fish which played round his fly, and which Mr. Pen 
 was endeavouring to hook ? 
 
 As for Miss Blanche, she had a kind heart ; and hav- 
 
 ing, as she owned, herself " suffered " a good deal in 
 the course of her brief life and experience why, she 
 could compassionate other susceptible beings like Pen, 
 who had suffered too. Her love for Laura and that dear 
 Mrs. Pendennis redoubled : if they were not at the Park, 
 she was not easy unless she herself was at Fairoaks. She
 
 PENDENNIS 351 
 
 played with Laura; she read French and German with 
 Laura; and Mr. Pen read French and German along 
 with them. He turned sentimental ballads of Schiller 
 and Goethe into English verse for the ladies, and 
 Blanche unlocked " Mes Larmes " for him, and im- 
 parted to him some of the plaintive outpourings of her 
 own tender Muse. 
 
 It appeared from these poems that the young creature 
 had indeed suffered prodigiously. She was familiar 
 with the idea of suicide. Death she repeatedly longed 
 for. A faded rose inspired her with such grief that you 
 would have thought she must die in pain of it. It was 
 a wonder how a young creature should have suffered so 
 much should have found the means of getting at such 
 an ocean of despair and passion ( as a run-away boy who 
 will get to sea) , and having embarked on it, should sur- 
 vive it. What a talent she must have had for weeping 
 to be able to pour out so many of " Mes Larmes! " 
 
 They were not particularly briny, Miss Blanche's 
 tears, that is the truth; but Pen, who read her verses, 
 thought them very well for a lady and wrote some 
 verses himself for her. His were very violent and pas- 
 sionate, very hot, sweet, and strong: and he not only 
 wrote verses; but O, the villain! O, the deceiver! he 
 altered and adapted former poems in his possession, and 
 which had been composed for a certain Miss Emily 
 Fotheringay, for the use and to the Christian name of 
 Miss Blanche Amory.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 A LITTLE INNOCENT 
 
 IAD, Strong," one day the Baronet 
 said, as the pair were conversing 
 after dinner over the billiard- 
 table, and that great unbosomer 
 of secrets, a cigar; "Egad, 
 Strong, 1 wish to the doose 
 your wife was dead." 
 
 "So do I. That's a 
 cannon, by Jove! But 
 she won't; she'll live for 
 ever you see if she 
 don't. Why do you wish 
 her off the hooks, Frank, 
 my boy? " asked Captain Strong. 
 
 " Because then you might marry Missy. She ain't 
 bad-looking. She'll have ten thousand, and that's a good 
 bit of money for such a poor old devil as you," drawled 
 out the other gentleman. " And egad, Strong, I hate 
 her worse and worse every day. I can't stand her, 
 Strong; by gad, I can't." 
 
 ' I wouldn't take her at twice the figure," Captain 
 Strong said, laughing. !< I never saw such a little devil 
 in my life." 
 
 ' I should like to poison her," said the sententious 
 Baronet; " by Jove I should." 
 
 352
 
 PENDENNIS 353 
 
 ' Why, what has she been at now? " asked his friend. 
 
 " Nothing particular," answered Sir Francis; " only 
 her old tricks. That girl has such a knack of making 
 everybody miserable that, hang me, it's quite surprising. 
 Last night she sent the governess crying away from the 
 dinner-table. Afterwards, as I was passing Frank's 
 room, I heard the poor little beggar howling in the dark, 
 and found his sister had been frightening his soul out 
 of his body, by telling him stories about the ghost that's 
 in the house. At lunch she gave my lady a turn; and 
 though my wife's a fool, she's a good soul I'm hanged 
 if she ain't." 
 
 " What did Missy do to her? " Strong asked. 
 
 " Why, hang me, if she didn't begin talking about the 
 late Amory, my predecessor," the Baronet said, with a 
 grin. " She got some picture out of ' the Keepsake,' and 
 said, she was sure it was like her dear father. She wanted 
 to know where her father's grave was. Hang her father ! 
 Whenever Miss Amory talks about him, Lady Claver- 
 ing always bursts out crying: and the little devil will 
 talk about him in order to spite her mother. To-day 
 when she began, I got in a confounded rage, said I was 
 her father, and and that sort of thing, and then, sir, 
 she took a shy at me." 
 
 " And what did she say about you, Frank? " Mr. 
 Strong, still laughing, inquired of his friend and patron. 
 
 " Gad, she said I wasn't her father; that I wasn't fit to 
 comprehend her ; that her father must have been a man 
 of genius, and fine feelings, and that sort of thing; 
 whereas I had married her mother for money." 
 
 " Well, didn't you? " asked Strong. 
 
 " It don't make it any the pleasanter to hear because 
 it's true, don't you know," Sir Francis Clavering an-
 
 354 PENDENNIS 
 
 swered. " I ain't a literary man and that ; but I ain't 
 such a fool as she makes me out. I don't know how it is, 
 but she always manages to to put me in the hole, don't 
 you understand. She turns all the house round her in 
 her quiet way, and with her confounded sentimental 
 airs. I wish she was dead, Ned." 
 
 " It was my wife whom you wanted dead just now," 
 Strong said, always in perfect good humour; upon 
 which the Baronet, with his accustomed candour, said, 
 ' Well, when people bore my life out, I do wish they 
 were dead, and I wish Missy were down a well with all 
 my heart." 
 
 Thus it will be seen from the above report of this can- 
 did conversation that our accomplished little friend had 
 some peculiarities or defects of character which rendered 
 her not very popular. She was a young lady of some 
 genius, exquisite sympathies and considerable literary 
 attainments, living, like many another genius, with 
 relatives who could not comprehend her. Neither her 
 mother nor her stepfather were persons of a literary 
 turn. " Bell's Life " and the " Racing Calendar " were 
 the extent of the Baronet's reading, and Lady Clavering 
 still wrote like a school-girl of thirteen, and with an 
 extraordinary disregard to grammar and spelling. And 
 as Miss Amory felt very keenly that she was not appre- 
 ciated, and that she lived with persons who were not her 
 equals in intellect or conversational power, she lost no 
 opportunity to acquaint her family circle with their in- 
 feriority to herself, and not only was a martyr, but took 
 care to let everybody know that she was so. If she suf- 
 fered, as she said and thought she did, severely, are we 
 to wonder that a young creature of such delicate sensi- 
 bilities should shriek and cry out a good deal? If a
 
 PENDENNIS 355 
 
 poetess may not bemoan her lot, of what earthly use is 
 her lyre? Blanche struck hers only to the saddest of 
 tunes ; and sang elegies over her dead hopes, dirges over 
 her early frost-nipt buds of affection, as became such a 
 melancholy fate and Muse. 
 
 Her actual distresses, as we have said, had not been up 
 to the present time very considerable: but her griefs 
 lay, like those of most of us, in her own soul that being 
 sad and habitually dissatisfied, what wonder that she 
 should weep? So " Mes Larmes " dribbled out of her 
 eyes any day at command: she could furnish an unlim- 
 ited supply of tears, and her faculty of shedding them 
 increased by practice. For sentiment is like another 
 complaint mentioned by Horace, as increasing by self- 
 indulgence ( I am sorry to say, ladies, that the complaint 
 in question is called the dropsy), and the more you cry, 
 the more you will be able and desirous to do so. 
 
 Missy had begun to gush at a very early age. Lamar- 
 tine was her favourite bard from the period when she 
 first could feel ; and she had subsequently improved her 
 mind by a sedulous study of novels of the great modern 
 authors of the French language. There was not a ro- 
 mance of Balzac and George Sand which the indefatiga- 
 ble little creature had not devoured by the time she was 
 sixteen: and, however little she sympathised with her 
 relatives at home, she had friends, as she said, in the 
 spirit-world, meaning the tender Indiana, the passion- 
 ate and poetic Lelia, the amiable Trenmor, that high- 
 souled convict, that angel of the galleys, the fiery 
 Stenio, and the other numberless heroes of the French 
 romances. She had been in love with Prince Rodolph 
 and Prince Djalma while she was yet at school, and 
 had settled the divorce question, and the rights of woman,
 
 356 PENDENNIS 
 
 with Indiana, before she had left off pinafores. The im- 
 petuous little lady played at love with these imaginary 
 worthies, as a little while before she had played at ma- 
 ternity with her doll. Pretty little poetical spirits I it 
 is curious to watch them with those playthings. To-day 
 the blue-eyed one is the favourite, and the black -eyed 
 one is pushed behind the drawers. To-morrow blue-eyes 
 may take its turn of neglect: and it may be an odious 
 little wretch with a burnt nose, or torn head of hair, and 
 no eyes at all, that takes the first place in Miss's affec- 
 tion, and is dandled and caressed in her arms. 
 
 As novelists are supposed to know everything, even 
 the secrets of female hearts, which the owners themselves 
 do not perhaps know, we may state that at eleven years 
 of age Mademoiselle Betsi, as Miss Amory was then 
 called, had felt tender emotions towards a young Savoy- 
 ard organ-grinder at Paris, whom she persisted in believ- 
 ing to be a prince carried off from his parents; that at 
 twelve an old and hideous drawing-master (but, ah, 
 what age or personal defects are proof against woman's 
 love?) had agitated her young heart; and that, at thir- 
 teen, being at Madame de Carmel's boarding-school, in 
 the Champs Elysees, which, as everybody knows, is next 
 door to Monsieur Rogron's (Chevalier of the Legion of 
 Honour) pension for young gentlemen, a correspon- 
 dence by letter took place between the seduisante Miss 
 Betsi and two young gentlemen of the College of Charle- 
 magne, who were pensioners of the Chevalier Rogron. 
 
 In the above paragraph our young friend has been 
 called by a Christian name, different to that under which 
 we were lately presented to her. The fact is, that Miss 
 Amory, called Missy at home, had really at the first been 
 christened Betsy but assumed the name of Blanche of
 
 PENDENNIS 357 
 
 her own will and fantasy, and crowned herself with it; 
 and the weapon which the Baronet, her stepfather, held 
 in terror over her, was the threat to call her publicly by 
 her name of Betsy, by which menace he sometimes man- 
 aged to keep the young rebel in order. 
 
 Blanche had had hosts of dear, dear, darling friends 
 ere now, and had quite a little museum of locks of hair 
 in her treasure-chest, which she had gathered in the 
 course of her sentimental progress. Some dear friends 
 had married: some had gone to other schools: one be- 
 loved sister she had lost from the pension, and found 
 again, O, horror! her darling, her Leocadie, keeping 
 the books in her father's shop, a grocer in the Rue du 
 Bac : in fact, she had met with a number of disappoint- 
 ments, estrangements, disillusionments, as she called 
 them in her pretty French jargon, and had seen and 
 suffered a great deal for so young a woman. But it is 
 the lot of sensibility to suffer, and of confiding tender- 
 ness to be deceived, and she felt that she was only under- 
 going the penalties of genius in these pangs and disap- 
 pointments of her young career. 
 
 Meanwhile, she managed to make the honest lady, her 
 mother, as uncomfortable as circumstances would per- 
 mit ; and caused her worthy stepfather to wish she was 
 dead. With the exception of Captain Strong, whose 
 invincible good humour was proof against her sarcasms, 
 the little lady ruled the whole house with her tongue. 
 If Lady Clavering talked about Sparrowgrass instead 
 of Asparagus, or called an object a hobject, as this un- 
 fortunate lady would sometimes do, Missy calmly cor- 
 rected her, and frightened the good soul, her mother, 
 into errors only the more frequent as she grew more 
 nervous under her daughter's eye.
 
 358 PENDENNIS 
 
 It is not to be supposed, considering the vast interest 
 which the arrival of the family at Clavering Park in- 
 spired in the inhabitants of the little town, that Madame 
 Fribsby alone, of all the folks in Clavering, should have 
 remained unmoved and incurious. At the first appear- 
 ance of the Park family in church, Madame noted every 
 article of toilette which the ladies wore, from their bon- 
 nets to their brodequins, and took a survey of the attire 
 of the ladies' maids in the pew allotted to them. We 
 fear that Doctor Portman's sermon, though it was one 
 of his oldest and most valued compositions, had little 
 effect upon Madame Fribsby on that day. In a very 
 few days afterwards, she had managed for herself an 
 interview with Lady Clavering's confidential attendant, 
 in the housekeeper's room at the Park ; and her cards in 
 French and English, stating that she received the newest 
 fashions from Paris from her correspondent Madame 
 Victorine, and that she was in the custom of making 
 court and ball dresses for the nobility and gentry of the 
 shire, were in the possession of Lady Clavering and Miss 
 Amory, and favourably received, as she was happy to 
 hear, by those ladies. 
 
 Mrs. Bonner, Lady Clavering's lady, became soon 
 a great frequenter of Madame Fribsby's drawing-room, 
 and partook of many entertainments at the milliner's ex- 
 pense. A meal of green tea, scandal, hot Sally-Lunn 
 cakes, and a little novel reading, were always at the 
 service of Mrs. Bonner, whenever she was free to pass 
 an evening in the town. And she found much more time 
 for these pleasures than her junior officer, Miss Amory's 
 maid, who seldom could be sp'ared for a holiday, and 
 was worked as hard as any factory girl by that inexorable 
 little Muse, her mistress.
 
 PENDENNIS 859 
 
 And there was another person connected with the 
 Clavering establishment, who became a constant guest 
 of our friend, the milliner. This was the chief of the 
 kitchen, Monsieur Mirobolant, with whom Madame 
 Fribsby soon formed an intimacy. 
 
 Not having been accustomed to the appearance or 
 society of persons of the French nation, the rustic in- 
 habitants of Clavering were not so favourably impressed 
 by Monsieur Alcide's manners and appearance, as that 
 gentleman might have desired that they should be. He 
 walked among them quite unsuspiciously upon the after- 
 noon of a summer day, when his services were not re- 
 quired at the House, in his usual favourite costume, 
 namely, his light green frock or paletot, his crimson 
 velvet waistcoat, with blue glass buttons, his pantalon 
 Ecossais, of a very large and decided check pattern, his 
 orange satin neck-cloth, and his jean -boots, with tips of 
 shiny leather, these, with a gold embroidered cap, and 
 a richly-gilt cane, or other varieties of ornament of a 
 similar tendency, formed his usual holiday costume, in 
 which he flattered himself there was nothing remarkable 
 (unless, indeed, the beauty of his person should attract 
 observation), and in which he considered that he exhib- 
 ited the appearance of a gentleman of good Parisian 
 ton. 
 
 He walked then down the street, grinning and ogling 
 every woman he met with glances, which he meant should 
 kill them outright, and peered over the railings, and in 
 at the windows, where females were, in the tranquil 
 summer evening. But Betsy, Mrs. Pybus's maid, shrank 
 back with a " Lor' bless us! " as Alcide ogled her over 
 the laurel bush; the Misses Baker, and their mamma, 
 stared with wonder; and presently a crowd began to
 
 360 PENDENNIS 
 
 follow the interesting foreigner, of ragged urchins and 
 children, who left their dirt-pies in the street to pursue 
 him. 
 
 For some time he thought that admiration was the 
 cause which led these persons in his wake, and walked 
 on, pleased himself that he could so easily confer on 
 others so much harmless pleasure. But the little children 
 and dirt-pie manufacturers were presently succeeded 
 by followers of a larger growth, and a number of lads 
 and girls from the factory being let loose at this hour, 
 joined the mob, and began laughing, jeering, hooting, 
 and calling opprobrious names at the Frenchman. Some 
 cried out, " Frenchy! Frenchy!" some exclaimed, 
 " Frogs! " one asked for a lock of his hair, which was 
 long and in richly -flowing ringlets; and at length the 
 poor artist began to perceive that he was an object of 
 derision rather than of respect to the rude grinning mob. 
 
 It was at this juncture that Madame Fribsby spied 
 the unlucky gentleman with the train at his heels, and 
 heard the scornful shouts with which they assailed him. 
 She ran out of her room, and across the street to the per- 
 secuted foreigner; she held out her hand, and, address- 
 ing him in his own language, invited him into her abode ; 
 and when she had housed him fairly within her door, she 
 stood bravely at the threshold before the gibing factory 
 girls and boys, and said they were a pack of cowards 
 to insult a poor man who could not speak their language, 
 and was alone and without protection. The little crowd, 
 with some ironical cheers and hootings, nevertheless felt 
 the force of Madame Fribsby's vigorous allocution, and 
 retreated before her; for the old lady was rather re- 
 spected in the place, and her oddity and her kindness 
 had made her many friends there.
 
 Mirobolant fascinates 
 the natives
 
 PENDENNIS 361 
 
 Poor Mirobolant was grateful indeed to hear the lan- 
 guage of his country ever so ill spoken. Frenchmen 
 pardon our faults in their language much more readily 
 than we excuse their bad English; and will face our 
 blunders throughout a long conversation, without the 
 least propensity to grin. The rescued artist vowed that 
 Madame Fribsby was his guardian angel, and that he 
 had not as yet met with such suavity and politeness 
 among les Anglaises. He was as courteous and compli- 
 mentary to her as if it was the fairest and noblest of 
 ladies whom he was addressing : for Alcide Mirobolant 
 paid homage after his fashion to all womankind, and 
 never dreamed of a distinction of ranks in the realms of 
 beauty, as his phrase was. 
 
 A cream, flavoured with pine-apple a mayonnaise of 
 lobster, which he flattered himself was not unworthy of 
 his hand, or of her to whom he had the honour to offer it 
 as an homage, and a box of preserved fruits of Provence, 
 were brought by one of the chef's aides-de-camp, in a 
 basket, the next day to the milliner's, and were ac- 
 companied with a gallant note to the amiable Madame 
 Fribsby. " Her kindness," Alcide said, " had made a 
 green place in the desert of his existence, her suavity 
 would ever contrast in memory with the grossierete of 
 the rustic population, who were not worthy to possess 
 such a jewel." An intimacy of the most confidential 
 nature thus sprang up between the milliner and the chief 
 of the kitchen ; but I do not know whether it was with 
 pleasure or mortification that Madame received the dec- 
 larations of friendship which the young Alcide prof- 
 fered to her, for he persisted in calling her, "La 
 respectable Fribsbi," " La vertueuse Fribsbi"and in 
 stating that he should consider her as his mother, while
 
 362 PENDENNIS 
 
 he hoped she would regard him as her son. Ah! it 
 was not very long ago, Fribsby thought, that words had 
 been addressed to her in that dear French language, in- 
 dicating a different sort of attachment. And she sighed 
 as she looked up at the picture of her Carabineer. For 
 it is surprising how young some people's hearts remain 
 when their heads have need of a front or a little hair-dye, 
 and, at this moment, Madame Fribsby, as she told 
 young Alcide, felt as romantic as a girl of eighteen. 
 
 When the conversation took this turn and at their 
 first intimacy Madame Fribsby was rather inclined so 
 to lead it Alcide always politely diverged to another 
 subject: it was as his mother that he persisted in con- 
 sidering the good milliner. He would recognize her in 
 no other capacity, and with that relationship the gentle 
 lady was forced to content herself, when she found how 
 deeply the artist's heart was engaged elsewhere. 
 
 He was not long before he described to her the subject 
 and origin of his passion. 
 
 " I declared myself to her," said Alcide, laying his 
 hand on his heart, " in a manner which was as novel 
 as I am charmed to think it was agreeable. Where can- 
 not Love penetrate, respectable Madame Fribsbi? Cu- 
 pid is the father of invention! I inquired of the domes- 
 tics what were the plats of which Mademoiselle partook 
 with most pleasure; and built up my little battery 
 accordingly. On a day when her parents had gone to 
 dine in the world (and I am grieved to say that a grossier 
 dinner at a restaurant, on the Boulevard, or in the Palais 
 Royal, seemed to form the delights of these unrefined 
 persons), the charming Miss entertained some comrades 
 of the pension ; and I advised myself to send up a little 
 repast suitable to so delicate young palates. Her lovely
 
 PENDENNIS 363 
 
 name is Blanche. The veil of the maiden is white ; the 
 wreath of roses which she wears is white. I determined 
 that my dinner should be as spotless as the snow. At her 
 accustomed hour, and instead of the rude gigot a I'eau 
 which was ordinarily served at her too simple table, I 
 sent her up a little potagc a la Reine a la Heine Blanche 
 I called it, as white as her own tint and confectioned 
 with the most fragrant cream and almonds. I then of- 
 fered up at her shrine a filet de merlan a V Agnes, and a 
 delicate plat, which I have designated as Eperlan a la 
 Sainte Therese, and of which my charming Miss par- 
 took with pleasure. I followed this by two little entrees 
 of sweet-bread and chicken; and the only brown thing 
 which I permitted myself in the entertainment was a 
 little roast of lamb, which I laid in a meadow of 
 spinaches, surrounded with croustillons, representing 
 sheep, and ornamented with daisies and other savage 
 flowers. After this came my second service : a pudding 
 a la Reine Elizabeth (who, Madame Fribsbi knows, was 
 a maiden princess) ; a dish of opal-coloured plovers' 
 eggs, which I called Nid de tourtereaux a la Roucoule; 
 placing in the midst of them two of those tender volatiles, 
 billing each other, and confectioned with butter; a 
 basket containing little gateaux of apricots, which, I 
 know, all young ladies adore; and a jelly of marasquin, 
 bland, insinuating, intoxicating as the glance of beauty. 
 This I designated Ambroisie de Calypso a la Souveraine 
 de mon Cceur. And when the ice was brought in an 
 ice of plombiere and cherries how do you think I had 
 shaped them, Madame Fribsbi? In the form of two 
 hearts united with an arrow, on which I had laid, before 
 it entered, a bridal veil in cut-paper, surmounted by a 
 wreath of virginal orange-flowers. I stood at the door
 
 364 PENDENNIS 
 
 to watch the effect of this entry. It was but one cry 
 of admiration. The three young ladies filled their glasses 
 with the sparkling Ay, and carried me in a toast. I heard 
 it I heard Miss speak of me I heard her say, 'Tell 
 Monsieur Mirobolant that we thank him we admire 
 him we love him!' My feet almost failed me as I 
 spoke. 
 
 " Since that, can I have any reason to doubt that the 
 young artist has made some progress in the heart of the 
 English Miss? I am modest, but my glass informs me 
 that I am not ill-looking. Other victories have convinced 
 me of the fact." 
 
 " Dangerous man! " cried the milliner. 
 
 ' The blonde misses of Albion see nothing in the dull 
 inhabitants of their brumous isle, which can compare 
 with the ardour and vivacity of the children of the South. 
 We bring our sunshine with us ; we are Frenchmen, and 
 accustomed to conquer. Were it not for this affair of 
 the heart, and my determination to marry an Anglaise, 
 do you think I would stop in this island (which is not 
 altogether ungrateful, since I have found here a tender 
 mother in the respectable Madame Fribsbi), in this is- 
 land, in this family? My genius would use itself in the 
 company of these rustics the poesy of my art cannot 
 be understood by these carnivorous insularies. No the 
 men are odious, but the women the women! I own, 
 dear Fribsbi, are seducing! I have vowed to marry one; 
 and as I cannot go into your markets and purchase, ac- 
 cording to the custom of the country, I am resolved to 
 adopt another custom, and fly with one to Gretna Grin. 
 The blonde Miss will go. She is fascinated. Her eyes 
 have told me so. The white dove wants but the signal 
 to fly."
 
 PENDENNIS 365 
 
 " Have you any correspondence with her? " asked 
 Fribsby, in amazement, and not knowing whether the 
 young lady or the lover might be labouring under a 
 romantic delusion. 
 
 " I correspond with her by means of my art. She 
 partakes of dishes which I make expressly for her. I 
 insinuate to her thus a thousand hints, which, as she is 
 perfectly spiritual, she receives. But I want other intel- 
 ligences near her." 
 
 ' There is Pincott, her maid," said Madame Fribsby, 
 who, by aptitude or education, seemed to have some 
 knowledge of affairs of the heart, but the great artist's 
 brow darkened at this suggestion. 
 
 " Madame," he said, " there are points upon which a 
 gallant man ought to silence himself; though, if he 
 break the secret, he may do so with the least impropriety 
 to his best friend his adopted mother. Know then, 
 that there is a cause why Miss Pincott should be hostile 
 to me a cause not uncommon with your sex jealousy." 
 
 " Perfidious monster! " said the confidante. 
 
 " Ah, no," said the artist, with a deep bass voice, and 
 a tragic accent worthy of the Porte St. Martin and his 
 favourite melo-drames, " Not perfidious, but fatal. Yes, 
 I am a fatal man, Madame Fribsbi. To inspire hopeless 
 passion is my destiny. I cannot help it that women love 
 me. Is it my fault that that young woman deperishes 
 and languishes to the view of the eye, consumed by a 
 flame which I cannot return? Listen! There are others 
 in this family who are similarly unhappy. The gover- 
 ness of the young Milor has encountered me in my walks, 
 and looked at me in a way which can bear but one inter- 
 pretation. And Milady herself, who is of mature age, 
 but who has oriental blood, has once or twice addressed
 
 366 PENDENNIS 
 
 compliments to the lonely artist which can admit of no 
 mistake. I avoid the household, I seek solitude, I un- 
 dergo my destiny. I can marry but one, and am re- 
 solved it shall be to a lady of your nation. And, if her 
 fortune is sufficient, I think Miss would be the person 
 who would be most suitable. I wish to ascertain what her 
 means are before I lead her to Gretna Grin." 
 
 Whether Alcide was as irresistible a conqueror as his 
 namesake, or whether he was simply crazy, is a point 
 which must be left to the reader's judgment. But the 
 latter, if he has had the benefit of much French acquain- 
 tance, has perhaps met with men amongst them who fan- 
 cied themselves almost as invincible; and who, if you 
 credit them, have made equal havoc in the hearts of les 
 Anglaises.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 CONTAINS BOTH LOVE AND JEALOUSY 
 
 UR readers have already 
 heard Sir Francis 
 Clavering's candid 
 opinion of the lady 
 who had given him 
 her fortune and re- 
 stored him to his 
 native country and 
 home, and it must 
 be owned that the 
 Baronet was not 
 far wrong in his 
 estimate of his 
 wife, and that 
 Lady Clavering 
 was not the wis- 
 est or the best 
 educated of women. She had had a couple of years' 
 education in Europe, in a suburb of London, which she 
 persisted in calling Ackney to her dying day, whence 
 she had been summoned to join her father at Calcutta 
 at the age of fifteen. And it was on her voyage thither, 
 on board the Ramchunder East Indiaman, Captain 
 Bragg, in which ship she had two years previously made 
 her journey to Europe, that she formed the acquaintance 
 of her first husband, Mr. Amory, who was third mate 
 of the vessel in question. 
 
 367
 
 368 PENDENNIS 
 
 We are not going to enter into the early part of Lady 
 Clavering's history, but Captain Bragg, under whose 
 charge Miss Snell went out to her father, who was one of 
 the Captain's consignees, and part owner of the Ram- 
 chunder and many other vessels, found reason to put 
 the rebellious rascal of a mate in irons, until they reached 
 the Cape, where the Captain left his officer behind : and 
 finally delivered his ward to her father at Calcutta, after 
 a stormy and perilous voyage in which the Ramchunder 
 and the cargo and passengers incurred no small danger 
 and damage. 
 
 Some months afterwards Amory made his appearance 
 at Calcutta, having worked his way out before the mast 
 from the Cape married the rich Attorney's daughter 
 in spite of that old speculator set up as indigo planter 
 and failed set up as agent and failed again set up 
 as editor of the " Sunderbund Pilot " and failed again 
 quarrelling ceaselessly with his father-in-law and his wife 
 during the progress of all these mercantile transactions 
 and disasters, and ending his career finally with a crash 
 which compelled him to leave Calcutta and go to New 
 South Wales. It was in the course of these luckless 
 proceedings, that Mr. Amory probably made the ac- 
 quaintance of Sir Jasper Rogers, the respected Judge 
 of the Supreme Court of Calcutta, who has been men- 
 tioned before : and, as the truth must out, it was by mak- 
 ing an improper use of his father-in-law's name, who 
 could write perfectly well, and had no need of an aman- 
 uensis, that fortune finally forsook Mr. Amory and 
 caused him to abandon all further struggles with her. 
 
 Not being in the habit of reading the Calcutta law- 
 reports very assiduously, the European public did not 
 know of these facts as well as people did in Bengal, and
 
 PENDENNIS 369 
 
 Mrs. Amory and her father, finding her residence in 
 India not a comfortable one, it was agreed that the lady 
 should return to Europe, whither she came with her little 
 daughter Betsy or Blanche, then four years old. They 
 were accompanied by Betsy's nurse, who has been pre- 
 sented to the reader in the last chapter as the confidential 
 maid of Lady Clavering, Mrs. Bonner: and Captain 
 Bragg took a house for them in the near neighbourhood 
 of his residence in Pocklington-street. 
 
 It was a very hard bitter summer, and the rain it rained 
 every day for some time after Mrs. Amory's arrival. 
 Bragg was very pompous and disagreeable, perhaps 
 ashamed, perhaps anxious to get rid of the Indian lady. 
 She believed that all the world in London was talking 
 about her husband's disaster, and that the King and 
 Queen and the Court of Directors were aware of her un- 
 lucky history. She had a good allowance from her father ; 
 she had no call to live in England ; and she determined to 
 go abroad. Away she went, then, glad to escape the 
 gloomy surveillance of the odious bully, Captain Bragg. 
 People had no objection to receive her at the continental 
 towns where she stopped, and at the various boarding- 
 houses, where she royally paid her way. She called 
 Hackney Ackney, to be sure (though otherwise she spoke 
 English with a little foreign twang, very curious and not 
 unpleasant) ; she dressed amazingly; she was conspicu- 
 ous for her love of eating and drinking, and prepared 
 curries and pillaus at every boarding-house which she 
 frequented; but her singularities of language and be- 
 haviour only gave a zest to her society, and Mrs. Amory 
 was deservedly popular. She was the most good-na- 
 tured, jovial, and generous of women. She was up to 
 any party of pleasure by whomsoever proposed. She
 
 370 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 brought three times more champagne and fowls and 
 ham to the picnics than anyone else. She took endless 
 boxes for the play, and tickets for the masked balls, and 
 gave them away to everybody. She paid the boarding- 
 house people months beforehand; she helped poor 
 
 shabby moustachioed bucks and dowagers, whose remit- 
 tances had not arrived, with constant supplies from her 
 purse; and in this way she tramped through Europe, 
 and appeared at Brussels, at Paris, at Milan, at Naples, 
 at Rome, as her fancy led her. News of Amory's death 
 reached her at the latter place, where Captain Clavering 
 was then staying, unable to pay his hotel bill, as, indeed, 
 was his friend, the Chevalier Strong, and the good- 
 natured widow married the descendant of the ancient 
 house of Clavering professing, indeed, no particular 
 grief for the scapegrace *of a husband whom she had
 
 PENDENNIS 371 
 
 lost: and thus we have brought her up to the present 
 time when she was mistress of Clavering Park. 
 
 Missy followed her mamma in most of her peregrina- 
 tions, and so learned a deal of life. She had a governess 
 for some time ; and after her mother's second marriage, 
 the benefit of Madame de Caramel's select pension in 
 the Champs Elysees. When the Claverings came to 
 England, she of course came with them. It was only 
 within a few years, after the death of her grandfather, 
 and the birth of her little brother, that she began to 
 understand that her position in life was altered, and that 
 Miss Amory, nobody's daughter, was a very small per- 
 sonage in a house compared with Master Francis Clav- 
 ering, heir to an ancient baronetcy, and a noble estate. 
 But for little Frank, she would have been an heiress, in 
 spite of her father: and though she knew and cared not 
 much about money, of which she never had any stint, and 
 though she was a romantic little Muse, as we have seen, 
 yet she could not reasonably be grateful to the persons 
 who had so contributed to change her condition: nor, 
 indeed, did she understand what the matter really was, 
 until she had made some further progress, and acquired 
 more accurate knowledge in the world. 
 
 But this was clear, that her stepfather was dull and 
 weak: that mamma dropped her H's, and was not re- 
 fined in manners or appearance; and that little Frank 
 was a spoiled quarrelsome urchin, always having his 
 way, always treading upon her feet, always upsetting 
 his dinner on her dresses, and keeping her out of her 
 inheritance. None of these, as she felt, could compre- 
 hend her: and her solitary heart naturally pined for 
 other attachments, and she sought around her where to 
 bestow the precious boon of her unoccupied affection.
 
 372 PENDENNIS 
 
 This dear girl, then, from want of sympathy, or 
 other cause, made herself so disagreeable at home, and 
 frightened her mother, and bored her step-father so 
 much, that they were quite as anxious as she could be 
 that she should settle for herself in life; and hence Sir 
 Francis Clavering's desire expressed to his friend, 
 in the last chapter, that Mrs. Strong should die, and 
 that he would take Blanche to himself as a second 
 Mrs. Strong. 
 
 But as this could not be, any other person was welcome 
 to win her : and a smart young fellow, well-looking and 
 well-educated, like our friend Arthur Pendennis, was 
 quite free to propose for her if he had a mind, and would 
 have been received with open arms by Lady Clavering as 
 a son-in-law, had he had the courage to come forward 
 as a competitor for Miss Amory's hand. 
 
 Mr. Pen, however, besides other drawbacks, chose to 
 entertain an extreme diffidence about himself. He was 
 ashamed of his late failures, of his idle and nameless 
 condition, of the poverty which he had brought on his 
 mother by his folly, and there was as much of vanity as 
 remorse in his present state of doubt and distrust. How 
 could he ever hope for such a prize as this brilliant 
 Blanche Amory, who lived in a fine park and mansion, 
 and was waited on by a score of grand domestics, whilst 
 a maid-servant brought in their meagre meal at Fair- 
 oaks, and his mother was obliged to pinch and manage 
 to make both ends meet? Obstacles seemed to him insur- 
 mountable, which would have vanished had he marched 
 manfully upon them: and he preferred despairing, or 
 dallying with his wishes, or perhaps he had not pos- 
 itively shaped them as yet, to attempting to win gal- 
 lantly the object of his desire. Many a young man
 
 PENDENNIS 373 
 
 fails by that species of vanity called shyness, who might, 
 for the asking, have his will. 
 
 But we do not pretend to say that Pen had, as yet, 
 ascertained his: or that he was doing much more than 
 thinking about falling in love. Miss Amory was charm- 
 ing and lively. She fascinated and cajoled him by a 
 thousand arts or natural graces or flatteries. But there 
 were lurking reasons and doubts, besides shyness and 
 vanity, withholding him. In spite of her cleverness, 
 and her protestations, and her fascinations, Pen's mother 
 had divined the girl, and did not trust her. Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis saw Blanche light-minded and frivolous, detected 
 many wants in her which offended the pure and pious- 
 minded lady; a want of reverence for her parents, and 
 for things more sacred, Helen thought : worldliness and 
 selfishness couched under pretty words and tender ex- 
 pressions. Laura and Pen battled these points strongly 
 at first with the widow Laura being as yet enthusiastic 
 about her new friend, and Pen not far-gone enough in 
 love to attempt any concealment of his feelings. He 
 would laugh at these objections of Helen's, and say, 
 " Psha, mother! you are jealous about Laura all wo- 
 men are jealous." 
 
 But when, in the course of a month or two, and by 
 watching the pair with that anxiety with which brood- 
 ing women watch over their son's affections and in 
 acknowledging which, I have no doubt there is a sexual 
 jealousy on the mother's part, and a secret pang when 
 Helen saw that the intimacy appeared to make progress, 
 that the two young people were perpetually finding pre- 
 texts to meet, and that Miss Blanche was at Fairoaks 
 or Mr. Pen at the Park every day, the poor widow's 
 heart began to fail her her darling project seemed to
 
 374 PENDENNIS 
 
 vanish before her ; and, giving way to her weakness, she 
 fairly told Pen one day what her views and longings 
 were; that she felt herself breaking, and not long for 
 this world, and that she hoped and prayed before she 
 went, that she might see her two children one. The 
 late events, Pen's life and career and former passion for 
 the actress, had broken the spirit of this tender lady. 
 She felt that he had escaped her, and was in the maternal 
 nest no more; and she clung with a sickening fondness 
 to Laura, Laura who had been left to her by Francis 
 in Heaven. 
 
 Pen kissed and soothed her in his grand patronising 
 way. He had seen something of this, he had long 
 thought his mother wanted to make this marriage did 
 Laura know anything of it? (Not she, Mrs. Penden- 
 nis said not for worlds would she have breathed a word 
 of it to Laura) " Well, well, there was time enough, 
 his mother wouldn't die," Pen said, laughingly: "he 
 wouldn't hear of any such thing, and as for the Muse, 
 she is too grand a lady to think about poor little me 
 and as for Laura, who knows that she would have me? 
 She would do anything you told her, to be sure. But 
 am I worthy of her? " 
 
 " O, Pen, you might be," was the widow's reply; not 
 that Mr. Pen ever doubted that he was; and a feeling 
 of indefinable pleasure and self-complacency came over 
 him as he thought over this proposal, and imaged Laura 
 to himself, as his memory remembered her for years past, 
 always fair and open, kindly and pious, cheerful, tender, 
 and true. He looked at her with brightening eyes as she 
 came in from the garden at the end of this talk, her 
 cheeks rather flushed, her looks frank and smiling 
 a basket of roses in her hand.
 
 PENDENNIS 375 
 
 She took the finest of them and brought it to Mrs. 
 Pendennis, who was refreshed by the odour and colour 
 of these flowers ; and hung over her fondly and gave it 
 to her. 
 
 " And I might have this prize for the asking! " Pen 
 thought, with a thrill of triumph, as he looked at the 
 kindly girl. ' Why, she is as beautiful and as generous 
 as her roses." The image of the two women remained 
 for ever after in his mind, and he never recalled it but 
 the tears came into his eyes. 
 
 Before very many weeks' intimacy with her new ac- 
 quaintance, however, Miss Laura was obliged to give 
 in to Helen's opinion, and own that the Muse was 
 selfish, unkind, and inconstant. 
 
 Little Frank, for instance, might be very provoking, 
 and might have deprived Blanche of her mamma's af- 
 fection, but this was no reason why Blanche should box 
 the child's ears because he upset a glass of water over 
 her drawing, and why she should call him many oppro- 
 brious names in the English and French language; and 
 the preference accorded to little Frank was certainly 
 no reason why Blanche should give herself im- 
 perial airs of command towards the boy's governess, 
 and send that young lady upon messages through the 
 house to bring her book or to fetch her pocket-hand- 
 kerchief. When a domestic performed an errand for 
 honest Laura, she was always thankful and pleased; 
 whereas, she could not but perceive that the little Muse 
 had not the slightest scruple in giving her commands to 
 all the world round about her, and in disturbing any- 
 body's ease or comfort, in order to administer to her own. 
 It was Laura's first experience in friendship; and it 
 pained the kind creature's heart- to be obliged to give up
 
 376 
 
 PENDEXNIS 
 
 as delusions, one by one, those charms and brilliant qual- 
 ities in which her fancy had dressed her new friend, and 
 to find that the fascinating little fairy was but a mortal, 
 and not a very amiable mortal after all. What generous 
 
 person is there that has not been so deceived in his time ? 
 what person, perhaps, that has not so disappointed 
 others in his turn ? 
 
 After the scene with little Frank, in which that re- 
 fractory son and heir of the house of Clavering had 
 received the compliments in French and English, and
 
 PENDENNIS 377 
 
 the accompanying box on the ear from his sister, Miss 
 Laura, who had plenty of humour, could not help calling 
 to mind some very touching and tender verses which 
 the Muse had read to her out of Mes Larmes, and which 
 began, " My pretty baby brother, may angels guard thy 
 rest," in which the Muse, after complimenting the baby 
 upon the station in life which it was about to occupy, and 
 contrasting it with her own lonely condition, vowed nev- 
 ertheless that the angel boy would never enjoy such 
 affection as hers was, or find in the false world before 
 him anything so constant and tender as a sister's heart. 
 " It may be," the forlorn one said, " it may be, you will 
 slight it, my pretty baby sweet, You will spurn me from 
 your bosom, I'll cling around your feet! O let me, let 
 me, love you! the world will prove to you As false as 
 'tis to others, but I am ever true." And behold the Muse 
 was boxing the darling brother's ears instead of kneeling 
 at his feet, and giving Miss Laura her first lesson in the 
 Cynical philosophy not quite her first, however, some- 
 thing like this selfishness and waywardness, something 
 like this contrast between practice and poetry, between 
 grand versified aspirations and every-day life, she had 
 witnessed at home in the person of our young friend 
 Mr. Pen. 
 
 But then Pen was different. Pen was a man. It 
 seemed natural, somehow, that he should be self-willed 
 and should have his own way. And under his wayward- 
 ness and selfishness, indeed, there was a kind and gen- 
 erous heart. O it was hard that such a diamond should 
 be changed away aerainst such a false stone as this. In 
 a word, Laura began to be tired of her admired Blanche. 
 She had assayed her and found her not true; and her 
 former admiration and delight, which she had expressed
 
 378 PENDENNIS 
 
 with her accustomed generous artlessness, gave way to 
 a feeling, which we shall not call contempt, but which 
 was very near it; and which caused Laura to adopt 
 towards Miss Amory a grave and tranquil tone of su- 
 periority, which was at first by no means to the Muse's 
 liking. Nobody likes to be found out, or, having held 
 a high place, to submit to step down. 
 
 The consciousness that this event was impending did 
 not serve to increase Miss Blanche's good humour, and 
 as it made her peevish and dissatisfied with herself, it 
 probably rendered her even less agreeable to the persons 
 round about her. So there arose, one fatal day, a battle- 
 royal between dearest Blanche and dearest Laura, in 
 which the friendship between them was all but slain out- 
 right. Dearest Blanche had been unusually capricious 
 and wicked on this day. She had been insolent to her 
 mother ; savage with little Frank ; odiously impertinent 
 in her behaviour to the boy's governess; and intolerably 
 cruel to Pincott, her attendant. Not venturing to attack 
 her friend (for the little tyrant was of a timid feline 
 nature, and only used her claws upon those who were 
 weaker than herself), she maltreated all these, and es- 
 pecially poor Pincott, who was menial, confidante, com- 
 panion (slave always), according to the caprice of her 
 young mistress. 
 
 This girl, who had been sitting in the room with the 
 young ladies, being driven thence in tears, occasioned 
 by the cruelty of her mistress, and raked with a parting 
 sarcasm as she went sobbing from the door, Laura fairly 
 broke out into a loud and indignant invective wondered 
 how one so young could forget the deference owing to 
 her elders as well as to her inferiors in station ; and pro- 
 fessing so much sensibility of her own, could torture the
 
 PENDENNIS 379 
 
 feelings of others so wantonly. Laura told her friend 
 that her conduct was absolutely wicked, and that she 
 ought to ask pardon of Heaven on her knees for it. And 
 having delivered herself of a hot and voluble speech 
 whereof the delivery astonished the speaker as much al- 
 most as her auditor, she ran to her bonnet and shawl, 
 and went home across the park in a great flurry and 
 perturbation, and to the surprise of Mrs. Pendennis, who 
 had not expected her until night. 
 
 Alone with Helen, Laura gave an account of the 
 scene, and gave up her friend henceforth. " O 
 Mamma," she said, " you were right ; Blanche, who 
 seems so soft and so kind, is, as you have said, selfish 
 and cruel. She who is always speaking of her affections 
 can have no heart. No honest girl would afflict a mother 
 so, or torture a dependant; and and, I give her up 
 from this day, and I will have no other friend but you." 
 
 On this the two ladies went through the osculatory 
 ceremony which they were in the habit of performing, 
 and Mrs. Pendennis got a great secret comfort from the 
 little quarrel for Laura's confession seemed to say, 
 ' That girl can never be a wife for Pen, for she is light- 
 minded and heartless, and quite unworthy of our noble 
 hero. He will be sure to find out her unworthiness for 
 his own part, and then he will be saved from this flighty 
 creature, and awake out of his delusion." 
 
 But Miss Laura did not tell Mrs. Pendennis, per- 
 haps did not acknowledge to herself, what had been the 
 real cause of the day's quarrel. Being in a very wicked 
 mood, and bent upon mischief everywhere, the little 
 wicked Muse of a Blanche had very soon begun her 
 tricks. Her darling Laura had come to pass a long day ; 
 and as they were sitting in jier own room together,
 
 380 PENDENNIS 
 
 had chosen to bring the conversation round to the sub- 
 ject of Mr. Pen. 
 
 " I am afraid he is sadly fickle," Miss Blanche ob- 
 served ; " Mrs. Pybus, and many more Clavering people, 
 have told us all about the actress." 
 
 " I was quite a child when it happened, and I don't 
 know anything about it," Laura answered, blushing very 
 much. 
 
 " He used her very ill," Blanche said, wagging her 
 little head. " He was false to her." 
 
 " I am sure he was not," Laura cried out; " he acted 
 most generously by her: he wanted to give up every- 
 thing to marry her. It was she that was false to him. 
 He nearly broke his heart about it: he 
 
 " I thought you didn't know anything about the story, 
 dearest," interposed Miss Blanche. 
 
 " Mamma has said so," said Laura. 
 
 ' Well, he is very clever," continued the other little 
 dear. ' What a sweet poet he is ! Have you ever read 
 his poems? " 
 
 " Only the ' Fisherman and the Diver,' which he trans- 
 lated for us, and his Prize Poem, which didn't get the 
 prize; and, indeed, I thought it very pompous and 
 prosy," Laura said, laughing. 
 
 " Has he never written you any poems, then, love? " 
 asked Miss Amory. 
 
 " No, my dear," said Miss Bell. 
 
 Blanche ran up to her friend, kissed her fondly, called 
 her my dearest Laura at least three times, looked her 
 archly in the face, nodded her head, and said, " Promise 
 to tell no-o-body, and I will show you something." 
 
 And tripping across the room daintily to a little 
 mother-of-pearl inlaid desk, she opened it with a silver 
 key, and took out two or three papers crumpled and
 
 PENDENNIS 381 
 
 rather stained with green, which she submitted to her 
 friend. Laura took them and read them. They were 
 love-verses sure enough something about Undine 
 about a Naiad about a river. She looked at them for 
 a long time ; but in truth the lines were not very distinct 
 before her eyes. 
 
 " And you have answered them, Blanche? " she asked, 
 putting them back. 
 
 " O no! not for worlds, dearest," the other said: and 
 when her dearest Laura had quite done with the verses, 
 she tripped back, and popped them again into the pretty 
 desk. 
 
 Then she went to her piano, and sang two or three 
 songs of Rossini whose flourishes of music her flexible 
 little voice could execute to perfection, and Laura sate 
 by, vaguely listening, as she performed these pieces. 
 What was Miss Bell thinking about the while? She 
 hardly knew; but sate there silent as the songs rolled 
 by. After this concert the young ladies were summoned 
 to the room where luncheon was served; and whither 
 they of course went with their arms round each other's 
 waists. 
 
 And it could not have been jealousy or anger on 
 Laura's part which had made her silent : for, after they 
 had tripped along the corridor and descended the steps, 
 and were about to open the door which leads into the 
 hall, Laura paused, and looking her friend kindly and 
 frankly in the face, kissed her with a sisterly warmth. 
 
 Something occurred after this Master Frank's man- 
 ner of eating, probably, or mamma's blunders, or Sir 
 Francis smelling of cigars which vexed Miss Blanche, 
 and she gave way to that series of naughtinesses whereof 
 we have spoken, and which ended in the above little 
 quarrel.
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 A HOUSE FULL OF VISITORS 
 
 THE difference between 
 .the girls did not last 
 long. Laura was al- 
 ways too eager to for- 
 give and be forgiven, 
 and as for Miss 
 Blanche, her hostilities, 
 never very long or 
 durable, had not been 
 provoked by the above 
 scene. Nobody cares 
 about being accused of 
 wickedness. No van- 
 ity is hurt by that sort 
 of charge : Blanche was 
 rather pleased than 
 
 provoked by her friend's indignation, which never would 
 have been raised but for a cause which both knew, though 
 neither spoke of. 
 
 And so Laura, with a sigh, was obliged to confess 
 that the romantic part of her first friendship was at an 
 end, and that the object of it was only worthy of a very 
 ordinary sort of regard. 
 
 As for Blanche, she instantly composed a copy of 
 touching verses, setting forth her desertion and disen- 
 chantment. It was only the old story she wrote, of love 
 
 382
 
 PENDENNIS 383 
 
 meeting with coldness, and fidelity returned by neglect ; 
 and some new neighbours arriving from London about 
 this time, in whose family there were daughters, Miss 
 Amory had the advantage of selecting an eternal friend 
 from one of these young ladies, and imparting her sor- 
 rows and disappointments to this new sister. The tall 
 footman came but seldom now with notes to the sweet 
 Laura; the pony carriage was but rarely despatched to 
 Fairoaks to be at the orders of the ladies there. Blanche 
 adopted a sweet look of suffering martyrdom when 
 Laura came to see her. The other laughed at her 
 friend's sentimental mood, and treated it with a good 
 humour that was by no means respectful. 
 
 But if Miss Blanche found new female friends to 
 console her, the faithful historian is also bound to say, 
 that she discovered some acquaintances of the other sex 
 who seemed to give her consolation too. If ever this 
 artless young creature met a young man, and had ten 
 minutes' conversation with him in a garden walk, in a 
 drawing-room window, or in the intervals of a waltz, she 
 confided in him, so to speak made play with her beauti- 
 ful eyes spoke in a tone of tender interest, and simple 
 and touching appeal, and left him, to perform the same 
 pretty little drama in behalf of his successor. 
 
 When the Claverings first came down to the Park, 
 there were very few audiences before whom Miss 
 Blanche could perform: hence Pen had all the benefits 
 of her glances, and confidences, and the drawing-room 
 window, or the garden walk all to himself. In the town 
 of Clavering, it has been said, there were actually no 
 young men: in the near surrounding country, only a 
 curate or two, or a rustic young squire, with large feet 
 and ill-made clothes. To the dragoons quartered at
 
 884 PENDENNIS 
 
 Chatteris the Baronet made no overtures: it was un- 
 luckily his own regiment: he had left it on bad terms 
 with some officers of the corps an ugly business about 
 a horse bargain a disputed play account at blind- 
 Hookey a white feather who need ask? it is not our 
 business to inquire too closely into the bygones of our 
 characters, except in so far as their previous history 
 appertains to the development of this present story. 
 
 The autumn, and the end of the Parliamentary Ses- 
 sion, and the London season, brought one or two county 
 families down to their houses, and filled tolerably the 
 neighbouring little watering-place of Baymouth, and 
 opened our friend Mr. Bingley's Theatre Royal at Chat- 
 teris, and collected the usual company at the Assizes and 
 Raceballs there. Up to this time, the old county families 
 had been rather shy of our friends of Clavering Park. 
 The Fogys of Drummington; the Squares of Dozley 
 Park; the Welbores of The Barrow, &c. All sorts of 
 stories were current among these folks regarding the 
 family at Clavering; indeed, nobody ought to say that 
 people in the country have no imagination, who hear 
 them talk about new neighbours. About Sir Fran- 
 cis and his Lady, and her birth and parentage, about 
 Miss Amory, about Captain Strong, there had been 
 endless histories which need not be recapitulated; and 
 the family of the Park had been three months in the 
 county before the great people around began to call. 
 
 But at the end of the season, the Earl of Trehawk, 
 Lord Lieutenant of the County, coming to Eyrie Castle, 
 and the Countess Dowager of Rockminster, whose son 
 was also a magnate of the land, to occupy a mansion on 
 the Marine Parade at Baymouth these great folks 
 came publicly, immediately, and in state, to call upon
 
 PENDENNIS 385 
 
 the family of Clavering Park ; and the carriages of the 
 county families speedily followed in the track, which had 
 been left in the avenue by their lordly wheels. 
 
 It was then that Mirobolant began to have an oppor- 
 tunity of exercising that skill which he possessed, and 
 of forgetting, in the occupations of his art, the pangs of 
 love. It was then that the large footmen were too much 
 employed at Clavering Park to be able to bring mes- 
 sages, or dally over the cup of small beer with the poor 
 little maids at Fairoaks. It was then that Blanche found 
 other dear friends than Laura, and other places to walk 
 in besides the river-side, where Pen was fishing. He 
 came day after day, and whipped the stream, but the 
 "fish, fish!" wouldn't do their duty, nor. the Peri ap- 
 pear. And here, though in strict confidence, and with a 
 request that the matter go no further, we may as well 
 allude to a delicate business, of which previous hint has 
 been given. Mention has been made, in a former page, 
 of a certain hollow tree, at which Pen used to take his 
 station when engaged in his passion for Miss Fotherin- 
 gay, and the cavity of which he afterwards used for 
 other purposes than to insert his baits and fishing-cans 
 in. The truth is, he converted this tree into a post-office. 
 Under a piece of moss and a stone, he used to put little 
 poems, or letters equally poetical, which were addressed 
 to a certain Undine or Naiad who frequented the stream, 
 and which, once or twice, were replaced by a receipt in 
 the shape of a flower, or by a modest little word or two 
 of acknowledgment, written in a delicate hand, in French 
 or English, and on pink scented paper. Certainly, Miss 
 Amory used to walk by this stream, as we have seen; 
 and it is a fact that she used pink scented paper for her 
 correspondence. But after the great folks had invaded
 
 386 PENDENNIS 
 
 Clavering Park, and the family coach passed out of the 
 lodge-gates, evening after evening, on their way to the 
 other great country houses, nobody came to fetch Pen's 
 letters at the post-office; the white paper was not ex- 
 changed for the pink, but lay undisturbed under its 
 stone and its moss, whilst the tree was reflected into the 
 stream, and the Brawl went rolling by. There was not 
 much in the letters certainly: in the pink notes scarcely 
 anything merely a little word or two, half jocular, half 
 sympathetic, such as might be written by any young 
 lady. But oh, you silly Pendennis, if you wanted this 
 one, why did you not speak ? Perhaps neither party was 
 in earnest. You were only playing at being in love, and 
 the sportive lijtle Undine was humouring you at the same 
 play. 
 
 Nevertheless if a man is baulked at this game, he not 
 unfrequently loses his temper; and when nobody came 
 any more for Pen's poems, he began to look upon those 
 compositions in a very serious light. He felt almost 
 tragical and romantic again, as in his first affair of the 
 heart: at any rate he was bent upon having an explana- 
 tion. One day he went to the Hall, and there was a 
 roomful of visitors: on another, Miss Amory was not 
 to be seen; she was going to a ball that night, and was 
 lying down to take a little sleep. Pen cursed balls, and 
 the narrowness of his means, and the humility of his 
 position in the county that caused him to be passed over 
 by the givers of these entertainments. On a third occa- 
 sion, Miss Amory was in the garden, and he ran thither; 
 she was walking there in state with no less personages 
 than the Bishop and Bishopess of Chatteris and the epis- 
 copal family, who scowled at him, and drew up in great 
 dignity when he was presented to them, and they heard
 
 PENDENNIS 387 
 
 his name. The Right Reverend Prelate had heard it be- 
 fore, and also of the little transaction in the Dean's 
 garden. 
 
 ' The Bishop says you're a sad young man," good- 
 natured Lady Clavering whispered to him. " What 
 have you been a doing of? Nothink, I hope, to vex such 
 a dear Mar as yours? How is your dear Mar? Why 
 don't she come and see me? We an't seen her this ever 
 such a time. We're a goin' about a gaddin', so that we 
 don't see no neighbours now. Give my love to her and 
 Laurar, and come all to dinner to-morrow." 
 
 Mrs. Pendennis was too unwell to come out, but 
 Laura and Pen came, and there was a great party, 
 and Pen only got an opportunity of a hurried word 
 with Miss Amory. ' You never come to the river now," 
 he said. 
 
 " I can't," said Blanche, " the house is full of people." 
 
 " Undine has left the stream," Mr. Pen went on, 
 choosing to be poetical. 
 
 " She never ought to have gone there," Miss Amory 
 answered. " She won't go again. It was very foolish, 
 very wrong: it was only play. Besides, you have other 
 consolations at home," she added, looking him full in 
 the face an instant, and dropping her eyes. 
 
 If he wanted her, why did he not speak then? She 
 might have said " Yes " even then. But as she spoke of 
 other consolations at home, he thought of Laura, so af- 
 fectionate and so pure, and of his mother at home, who 
 had bent her fond heart upon uniting him with her 
 adopted daughter. " Blanche ! " he began, in a vexed 
 tone," Miss Amory! " 
 
 " Laura is looking at us, Mr. Pendennis," the young 
 lady said. " I must go back to .the company," and she
 
 388 PENDENNIS 
 
 ran off, leaving Mr. Pendennis to bite his nails in 
 perplexity, and to look out into the moonlight in the 
 garden. 
 
 Laura indeed was looking at Pen. She was talking 
 with, or appearing to listen to the talk of, Mr. Pynsent, 
 Lord Rockminster's son, and grandson of the Dowager 
 Lady, who was seated in state in the place of honour, 
 gravely receiving Lady Clavering's bad grammar, and 
 patronising the vacuous Sir Francis, whose interest in 
 the county she was desirous to secure. Pynsent and Pen 
 had been at Oxbridge together, where the latter, during 
 his heyday of good fortune and fashion, had been the 
 superior of the young patrician, and perhaps rather su- 
 percilious towards him. They had met for the first time, 
 since they had parted at the University, at the table to- 
 day, and given each other that exceedingly impertinent 
 and amusing demi-nod of recognition which is practised 
 in England only, and only to perfection by University 
 men, and which seems to say, " Confound you what 
 do you do here? " 
 
 " I knew that man at Oxbridge," Mr. Pynsent said 
 to Miss Bell" a Mr. Pendennis, I think." 
 
 " Yes," said Miss Bell- 
 
 " He seems rather sweet upon Miss Amory," the gen- 
 tleman went on. Laura looked at them, and perhaps 
 thought so too, but said nothing. 
 
 "A man of large property in the county, ain't he? 
 He used to talk about representing it. He used to 
 speak at the Union. Whereabouts do his estates lie? " 
 
 Laura smiled. " His estates lie on the other side of 
 the river, near the lodge gate. He is my cousin, and 
 I live there." 
 
 ' Where? " asked Mr. Pynsent, with a laugh.
 
 PENDENNIS 389 
 
 " Why, on the other side of the river, at Fairoaks," 
 answered Miss Bell. 
 
 " Many pheasants there? Cover looks rather good," 
 said the simple gentleman. 
 
 Laura smiled again. ' We have nine hens and a cock, 
 a pig, and an old pointer." 
 
 " Pendennis don't preserve, then?" continued Mr. 
 Pynsent. 
 
 " You should come and see him," the girl said, laugh- 
 ing, and greatly amused at the notion that her Pen was 
 a great county gentleman, and perhaps had given him- 
 self out to be such. 
 
 " Indeed, I quite long to renew our acquaintance," 
 Mr. Pynsent said, gallantly, and with a look which fairly 
 said, " It is you that I would like to come and see " to 
 which look and speech Miss Laura vouchsafed a smile, 
 and made a little bow. 
 
 Here Blanche came stepping up with her most fasci- 
 nating smile and ogle, and begged dear Laura to come 
 and take the second in a song. Laura was ready to do 
 anything good-natured, and went to the piano; by 
 which Mr. Pynsent listened as long as the duet lasted, 
 and until Miss Amory began for herself, when he strode 
 away. 
 
 ' What a nice, frank, amiable, well-bred girl that is, 
 Wagg," said Mr. Pynsent to a gentleman who had come 
 over with him from Baymouth " the tall one I mean, 
 with the ringlets and the red lips monstrous red, ain't 
 they? " 
 
 ' What do you think of the girl of the house? " asked 
 Mr. Wagg. 
 
 " I think she's a lean, scraggy humbug," said Mr. 
 Pynsent, with great candour. .** She drags her shoul-
 
 390 PENDENNIS 
 
 ders out of her dress : she never lets her eyes alone : and 
 she goes simpering and ogling about like a French wait- 
 ing-maid." 
 
 " Pynsent, be civil," cried the other, " somebody can 
 hear."" 
 
 " Oh, it's Pendennis of Boniface," Mr. Pynsent said. 
 " Fine evening, Mr. Pendennis; we were just talking of 
 your charming cousin." 
 
 " Any relation to my old friend, Major Pendennis? " 
 asked Mr. Wagg. 
 
 " His nephew. Had the pleasure of meeting you at 
 Gaunt House," Mr. Pen said with his very best air 
 the acquaintance between the gentlemen was made in 
 an instant. 
 
 In the afternoon of the next day, the two gentlemen 
 who were staying at Clavering Park were found by Mr. 
 Pen on his return from a fishing excursion, in which he 
 had no sport, seated in his mother's drawing-room in 
 comfortable conversation with the widow and her ward. 
 Mr. Pynsent, tall and gaunt, with large red whiskers 
 and an imposing tuft to his chin, was striding over a 
 chair in the intimate neighbourhood of Miss Laura. She 
 was amused by his talk, which was simple, straightfor- 
 ward, rather humorous, and keen, and interspersed 
 with homely expressions of a style which is sometimes 
 called slang. It was the first specimen of a young Lon- 
 don dandy that Laura had seen or heard; for she had 
 been but a chit at the time of Mr. Foker's introduction 
 at Fairoaks, nor indeed was that ingenuous gentleman 
 much more than a boy, and his refinement was only 
 that of a school and college. 
 
 Mr. Wagg, as he entered the Fairoaks premises with
 
 PENDENNIS 391 
 
 his companion, eyed and noted everything. " Old gar- 
 dener," he said, seeing Mr. John at the lodge " old red 
 livery waistcoat clothes hanging out to dry on the 
 gooseberry bushes blue aprons, white ducks gad, they 
 must be young Pendennis's white ducks nobody else 
 wears 'em in the family. Rather a shy place for a suck- 
 ing county member, ay, Pynsent? " 
 
 " Snug little crib," said Mr. Pynsent, " pretty cozy 
 little lawn." 
 
 "Mr. Pendennis at home, old gentleman?" Mr. 
 Wagg said to the old domestic. John answered, " No, 
 Master Pendennis was agone out." 
 
 " Are the ladies at home? " asked the younger visitor. 
 Mr. John answered, " Yes, they be ; " and as the pair 
 walked over the trim gravel, and by the neat shrub- 
 beries, up the steps to the hall-door, which old John 
 opened, Mr. Wagg noted everything that he saw; the 
 barometer and the letter-bag, the umbrellas and the 
 ladies' clogs, Pen's hats and tartan wrapper, and old 
 John opening the drawing-room door, to introduce the 
 new comers. Such minutiae attracted Wagg instinc- 
 tively ; he seized them in spite of himself. 
 
 " Old fellow does all the work," he whispered to 
 Pynsent. " Caleb Balderstone. Shouldn't wonder if 
 he's the housemaid." The next minute the pair were 
 in the presence of the Fairoaks ladies; in whom Pyn- 
 sent could not help recognising two perfectly well-bred 
 ladies, and to whom Mr. Wagg made his obeisance, with 
 florid bows, and extra courtesy, accompanied with an 
 occasional knowing leer at his companion. Mr. Pynsent 
 did not choose to acknowledge these signals, except by 
 extreme haughtiness towards Mr. Wagg, and particular 
 deference to the ladies. If there was one thing laugh-
 
 392 PENDENNIS 
 
 able in Mr. Wagg's eyes, it was poverty. He had the 
 soul of a butler who had been brought from his pantry 
 to make fun in the drawing-room. His jokes were 
 plenty, and his good-nature thoroughly genuine, but 
 he did not seem to understand that a gentleman could 
 wear an old coat, or that a lady could be respectable 
 unless she had her carriage, or employed a French 
 milliner. 
 
 " Charming place, ma'am," said he, bowing to the 
 widow; "noble prospect delightful to us Cockneys, 
 who seldom see anything but Pall Mall." The widow 
 said, simply, she had never been in London but once in 
 her life before her son was born. 
 
 " Fine village, ma'am, fine village," said Mr. Wagg, 
 " and increasing every day. It'll be quite a large town 
 soon. It's not a bad place to live in for those who can't 
 get the country, and will repay a visit when you hon- 
 our it." 
 
 " My brother, Major Pendennis, has often mentioned 
 your name to us," the widow said, " and we have been 
 amused by some of your droll books, sir," Helen con- 
 tinued, who never could be brought to like Mr. Wagg's 
 books, and detested their tone most thoroughly. 
 
 " He is my very good friend," Mr. Wagg said, with a 
 low bow, " and one of the best known men about town, 
 and where known, ma'am, appreciated I assure you, 
 appreciated. He is with our friend Steyne, at Aix-la- 
 Chapelle. Steyne has a touch of the gout, and so, be- 
 tween ourselves, has your brother. I am going to Still- 
 brook for the pheasant-shooting, and afterwards to 
 Bareacres, where Pendennis and I shall probably meet ; " 
 and he poured out a flood of fashionable talk, introduc- 
 ing the names of a score of peers, and rattling on with
 
 A morning visit 
 at tea-time
 
 PENDENNIS 393 
 
 breathless spirits, whilst the simple widow listened in 
 silent wonder. What a man, she thought; are all the 
 men of fashion in London like this ? I am sure Pen will 
 never be like him. 
 
 Mr. Pynsent was in the meanwhile engaged with Miss 
 Laura. He named some of the houses in the neighbour- 
 hood whither he was going, and hoped very much that 
 he should see Miss Bell at some of them. He hoped 
 that her aunt would give her a season in London. He 
 said, that in the next parliament it was probable he 
 should canvass the county, and he hoped to get Pen- 
 dennis's interest here. He spoke of Pen's triumph 
 as an orator at Oxbridge, and asked was he coming 
 into parliament too? He talked on very pleasantly, 
 and greatly to Laura's satisfaction, until Pen him- 
 self appeared and, as has been said, found these gen- 
 tlemen. 
 
 Pen behaved very courteously to the pair, now that 
 they had found their way into his quarters ; and though 
 he recollected with some twinges a conversation at Ox- 
 bridge, when Pynsent was present, and in which, after 
 a great debate at the Union, and in the midst of con- 
 siderable excitement, produced by a supper and cham- 
 pagne-cup, he had announced his intention of coming 
 in for his native county, and had absolutely returned 
 thanks in a fine speech as the future member; yet Mr. 
 Pynsent's manner was so frank and cordial, that Pen 
 hoped Pynsent might have forgotten his little fanfar- 
 onnade, and any other braggadocio speeches or actions 
 which he might have made. He suited himself to the 
 tone of the visitors then, and talked about Plinlimmon 
 and Magnus Charters, and the old set at Oxbridge, with 
 careless familiarity and high-bred ease, as if he lived
 
 394 PENDENNIS 
 
 with marquises every day, and a duke was no more to 
 him than a village curate. 
 
 But at this juncture, and it being then six o'clock in 
 the evening, Betsy, the maid, who did not know of the 
 advent of strangers, walked into the room without any 
 preliminary but that of flinging the door wide open be- 
 fore her, and bearing in her arms a tray, containing three 
 tea-cups, a tea-pot, and a plate of thick bread-and-butter. 
 All Pen's splendour and magnificence vanished away at 
 this and he faltered and became quite abashed. " What 
 will they think of us? " he thought: and, indeed, Wagg 
 thrust his tongue in his cheek, thought the tea utterly 
 contemptible, and leered and winked at Pynsent to that 
 effect. 
 
 But to Mr. Pynsent the transaction appeared per- 
 fectly simple there was no reason present to his mind 
 why people should not drink tea at six if they were 
 minded, as well as at any other hour; and he asked of 
 Mr. Wagg, when they went away, " What the devil he 
 was grinning and winking at, and what amused him? " 
 
 " Didn't you see how the cub was ashamed of the 
 thick bread-and-butter? I dare say they're going to 
 have treacle if they are good. I'll take an opportunity 
 of telling old Pendennis when we get back to town," 
 Mr. Wagg chuckled out. 
 
 " Don't see the fun," said Mr. Pynsent. 
 
 " Never thought you did," growled Wagg between 
 his teeth ; and they walked home rather sulkily. 
 
 Wagg told the story at dinner very smartly, with 
 wonderful accuracy of observation. He described old 
 John, the clothes that were drying, the clogs in the hall, 
 the drawing-room, and its furniture and pictures; " Old 
 man with a beak and bald head feu Pendennis, I bet
 
 PENDENNIS 395 
 
 two to one; sticking-plaster full-length of a youth in 
 a cap and gown the present Marquis of Fairoaks, 
 of course; the widow when young in a miniature, 
 Mrs. Mee; she had the gown on when we came, or a 
 dress made the year after, and the tips cut off the fin- 
 gers of her gloves which she stitches her son's collars 
 with ; and then the sarving maid came in with their teas ; 
 so we left the Earl and the Countess to their bread-and- 
 butter." 
 
 Blanche, near whom he sate as he told this story, and 
 who adored les kommes d f esprit , burst out laughing, and 
 called him such an odd, droll creature. But Pynsent, 
 who began to be utterly disgusted with him, broke out 
 in a loud voice, and said, " I don't know, Mr. Wagg, 
 what sort of ladies you are accustomed to meet in your 
 own family, but by gad, as far as a first acquaintance 
 can show, I never met two better-bred women in my life, 
 and I hope, ma'am, you'll call upon 'em," he added, ad- 
 dressing Lady Rockminster, who was seated at Sir 
 Francis Clavering's right hand. 
 
 Sir Francis turned to the guest on his left, and whis- 
 pered, " That's what I call a sticker for Wagg." And 
 Lady Clavering, giving the young gentleman a delighted 
 tap with her fan, winked her black eyes at him, and said, 
 " Mr. Pynsent, you're a good feller." 
 
 After the affair with Blanche, a difference ever so 
 slight, a tone of melancholy, perhaps a little bitter, might 
 be perceived in Laura's converse with her cousin. She 
 seemed to weigh him, and find him wanting too; the 
 widow saw the girl's clear and honest eyes watching the 
 young man at times, and a look of almost scorn pass 
 over her face, as he lounged in the room with the women, 
 or lazily sauntered smoking upon the lawn, or lolled
 
 390 PENDENNIS 
 
 under a tree there over a book, which he was too listless 
 to read. 
 
 'What has happened between you?" eager-sighted 
 Helen asked of the girl. " Something has happened. 
 Has that wicked little Blanche been making mischief? 
 Tell me, Laura." 
 
 " Nothing has happened at all," Laura said. 
 
 * Then why do you look at Pen- so? " asked his mother 
 quickly. 
 
 " Look at him, dear mother! " said the girl. " We 
 two women are no society for him: we don't interest 
 him ; we are not clever enough for such a genius as Pen. 
 He wastes his life and energies away among us, tied to 
 our apron-strings. He interests himself in nothing: he 
 scarcely cares to go beyond the garden-gate. Even 
 Captain Glanders and Captain Strong pall upon him," 
 she added with a bitter laugh ; " and they are men you 
 know, and our superiors. He will never be happy while 
 he is here. Why is he not facing the world, and without 
 a profession? " 
 
 ' We have got enough, with great economy," said the 
 widow, her heart beginning to beat violently. " Pen has 
 spent nothing for months. I'm sure he is very good. I 
 am sure he might be very happy with us." 
 
 " Don't agitate yourself so, dear .mother," the girl 
 answered. " I don't like to see you so. You should not 
 be sad because Pen is unhappy here. All men are so. 
 They must work. They must make themselves names 
 and a place in the world. Look, the two captains have 
 fought and seen battles: that Mr. Pynsent, who came 
 here, and who will be very rich, is in a public office; he 
 works very hard, he aspires to a name and a reputation. 
 He says Pen was one of the best speakers at Oxbridge,
 
 PENDENNIS 397 
 
 and had as great a character for talent as any of the 
 young gentlemen there. Pen himself laughs at Mr. 
 Wagg's celebrity (and indeed he is a horrid person), 
 and says he is a dunce, and that anybody could write 
 his books." 
 
 " I am sure they are odious," interposed the widow. 
 
 ( Yet he has a reputation. You see the County 
 Chronicle says, ' The celebrated Mr. Wagg has been so- 
 journing at Baymouth let our fashionables and eccen- 
 trics look out for something from his caustic pen.' If 
 Pen can write better than this gentleman, and speak bet- 
 ter than Mr. Pynsent, why doesn't he? Mamma, he 
 can't make speeches to us; or distinguish himself here. 
 He ought to go away, indeed he ought." 
 
 " Dear Laura," said Helen, taking the girl's hand. 
 " Is it kind of you to hurry him so? I have been wait- 
 ing. I have been saving up money these many months 
 to to pay back your advance to us." 
 
 " Hush, mother! " Laura cried, embracing her friend 
 hastily. " It was your money, not mine. Never speak 
 about that again. How much money have you saved ? " 
 
 Helen said there were more than two hundred pounds 
 at the bank, and that she would be enabled to pay off 
 all Laura's money by the end of the next year. 
 
 " Give it him let him have the two hundred pounds. 
 Let him go to London and be a lawyer: be something, 
 be worthy of his mother and of mine, dearest mamma," 
 said the good girl ; upon which, and with her usual ten- 
 derness and emotion, the fond widow declared that 
 Laura was a blessing to her, and the best of girls and 
 I hope no one in this instance will be disposed to contra- 
 dict her. 
 
 The widow and her daughter had more than one con-
 
 398 PENDENNIS 
 
 versation on this subject: the elder gave way to the 
 superior reason of the honest and stronger minded girl; 
 and, indeed, whenever there was a sacrifice to be made 
 on her part, this kind lady was only too eager to make it. 
 But she took her own way, and did not lose sight of 
 the end she had in view, in imparting these new plans 
 to Pen. One day she told him of these projects, and 
 who it was that had formed them; how it was Laura 
 who insisted upon his going to London and studying; 
 how it was Laura who would not hear of the the money 
 arrangements when he came back from Oxbridge be- 
 ing settled just then: how it was Laura whom he had to 
 thank, if indeed he thought he ought to go. 
 
 At that news Pen's countenance blazed up with plea- 
 sure, and he hugged his mother to his heart with an 
 ardour that I fear disappointed the fond lady; but she 
 rallied when he said, " By Heaven ! she is a noble girl, 
 and may God Almighty bless her! Oh mother! I have 
 been wearying myself away for months here, longing 
 to work, and not knowing how. I've been fretting over 
 the thoughts of my shame, and my debts, and my past 
 cursed extravagance and follies. I've suffered infer- 
 nally. My heart has been half -broken never mind 
 about that. If I can get a chance to redeem the past, 
 and to do my duty to myself and the best mother in the 
 world, indeed, indeed, I will. I'll be worthy of you yet. 
 Heaven bless you! God bless Laura! Why isn't she 
 here, that I may go and thank her? " Pen went on with 
 more incoherent phrases ; paced up and down the room, 
 drank glasses of water, jumped about his mother with 
 a thousand embraces began to laugh began to sing- 
 was happier than she had seen him since he was a boy 
 -since he had tasted of the fruit of that awful Tree
 
 PENDENNIS 399 
 
 of Life which, from the beginning, has tempted all man- 
 kind. 
 
 Laura was not at home. Laura was on a visit to the 
 stately Lady Rockminster, daughter to my Lord Bare- 
 acres, sister to the late Lady Pontypool, and by conse- 
 quence a distant kinswoman of Helen's, as her ladyship, 
 who was deeply versed in genealogy, was the first gra- 
 ciously to point out to the modest country lady. Mr. 
 Pen was greatly delighted at the relationship being ac- 
 knowledged, though perhaps not over well pleased that 
 Lady Rockminster took Miss Bell home with her for a 
 couple of days to Baymouth, and did not make the 
 slightest invitation to Mr. Arthur Pendennis. There 
 was to be a ball at Baymouth, and it was to be Miss 
 Laura's first appearance. The dowager came to fetch 
 her in her carriage, and she went off with a white dress 
 in her box, happy and blushing, like the rose to which 
 Pen compared her. 
 
 This was the night of the ball a public entertainment 
 at the Baymouth Hotel. " By Jove! " said Pen, " I'll 
 ride over No, I won't ride, but I'll go too." His 
 mother was charmed that he should do so; and, as he 
 was debating about the conveyance in which he should 
 start for Baymouth, Captain Strong called opportunely, 
 said he was going himself, and that he would put his 
 horse, The Butcher Boy, into the gig, and drive Pen 
 over. 
 
 When the grand company began to fill the house at 
 Clavering Park, the Chevalier Strong seldom intruded 
 himself upon its society, but went elsewhere to seek his 
 relaxation. ' I've seen plenty of grand dinners in my 
 time," he said, " and dined, by Jove, in a company where
 
 400 PENDENNIS 
 
 there was a king and royal duke at top and bottom, 
 and every man along the table had six stars on his coat ; 
 but dammy, Glanders, this finery don't suit me ; and the 
 English ladies with their confounded buckram airs, and 
 the squires with their politics after dinner, send me to 
 sleep sink me dead if they don't. I like a place where 
 I can blow my cigar when the cloth is removed, and 
 when I'm thirsty, have my beer in its native pewter." 
 So on a gala day at Clavering Park, the Chevalier would 
 content himself with superintending the arrangements 
 of the table, and drilling the major-domo and servants; 
 and having looked over the bill of fare with Monsieur 
 Mirobolant, would not care to take the least part in 
 the banquet. " Send me up a cutlet and a bottle of 
 claret to my room," this philosopher would say, and 
 from the windows of that apartment, which commanded 
 the terrace and avenue, he would survey the company 
 as they arrived in their carriages, or take a peep at the 
 ladies in the hall through an oeil-de-boeuf which com- 
 manded it from his corridor. And the guests being 
 seated, Strong would cross the park to Captain Glan- 
 ders's cottage at Clavering, or to pay the landlady a visit 
 at the Clavering Arms, or to drop in upon Madame 
 Fribsby over 'her novel and tea. Wherever the Cheva- 
 lier went he was welcome, and whenever he came away 
 a smell of hot brandy and water lingered behind him. 
 
 The Butcher Boy not the worst horse in Sir Francis's 
 stable was appropriated to Captain Strong's express 
 use; and the old Campaigner saddled him and brought 
 him home at all hours of the day or night, and drove or 
 rode him up and down the country. Where there was 
 a public-house with a good tap of beer where there was 
 a tenant with a pretty daughter who played on the piano
 
 PENDENNIS 401 
 
 to Chatteris, to the play, or the barracks to Bay- 
 mouth, if any fun was on foot there; to the rural fairs 
 or races, the Chevalier and his brown horse made their 
 way continually; and this worthy gentleman lived at 
 free quarters in a friendly country. The Butcher Boy 
 soon took Pen and the Chevalier to Baymouth. The 
 latter was as familiar with the hotel and landlord there 
 as with every other inn round about; and having been 
 accommodated with a bed-room to dress, they entered 
 the ball-room. The Chevalier was splendid. He wore 
 three little gold crosses in a brochette on the portly breast 
 of his blue coat, and looked like a foreign field-marshal. 
 
 The ball was public and all sorts of persons were 
 admitted and encouraged to come, young Pynsent hav- 
 ing views upon the county, and Lady Rockminster being 
 patroness of the ball. There was a quadrille for the 
 aristocracy at one end, and select benches for the people 
 of fashion. Towards this end the Chevalier did not care 
 to penetrate far (as he said he did not care for the nobs) ; 
 but in the other part of the room he knew everybody 
 the wine-merchants', innkeepers', tradesmen's, solicitors', 
 squire-farmers' daughters, their sires and brothers, and 
 plunged about shaking hands. 
 
 ' Who is that man with the blue ribbon and the three- 
 pointed star? " asked Pen. A gentleman in black with 
 ringlets and a tuft stood gazing fiercely about him, with 
 one hand in the arm-hole of his waistcoat and the other 
 holding his claque. 
 
 "By Jupiter, it's Mirobolant ! " cried Strong, burst- 
 ing out laughing. " Bon jour, Chef ! Bon jour, Cheva- 
 lier! " 
 
 " De la croix de Juillet, Chevalier! " said the Chef, 
 laying his hand on his decoration.
 
 402 PENDENNIS 
 
 "By Jove, here's some more ribbon!" said Pen, 
 amused. 
 
 A man with very black hair and whiskers, dyed evi- 
 dently with the purple of Tyre, with twinkling eyes and 
 white eyelashes, and a thousand wrinkles in his face, 
 which was of a strange red colour, with two under-vests 
 and large gloves and hands, and a profusion of diamonds 
 and jewels in his waistcoat and stock, with coarse feet 
 crumpled into immense shiny boots, and a piece of parti- 
 coloured ribbon in his button-hole, here came up and 
 nodded familiarly to the Chevalier. 
 
 The Chevalier shook hands. " My friend Mr. Pen- 
 dennis," Strong said. " Colonel Altamont, of the body- 
 guard of his Highness the Nawaub of Lucknow." That 
 officer bowed to the salute of Pen ; who was now looking 
 out eagerly to see if the person he wanted had entered 
 the room. 
 
 Not yet. But the band began presently performing 
 " See the Conquering Hero comes," and a host of fash- 
 ionablesDowager Countess of Rockminster, Mr. Pyn- 
 sent and Miss Bell, Sir Francis Clavering, Bart., of 
 Clavering Park, Lady Clavering and Miss Amory, Sir 
 Horace Fogey, Bart., Lady Fogey, Colonel and Mrs. 
 Higgs, Wagg, Esq. (as the county paper after- 
 wards described them) , entered the room. 
 
 Pen rushed by Blanche, ran up to Laura, and seized 
 her hand. " God bless you! " he said, " I want to speak 
 to you I must speak to you Let me dance with you." 
 " Not for three dances, dear Pen," she said, smiling: 
 and he fell back, biting his nails with vexation, and for- 
 getting to salute Pynsent. 
 
 After Lady Rockminster's party, Lady Clavering's 
 followed in the procession.
 
 PENDENNIS 403 
 
 Colonel Altamont eyed it hard, holding a most musky 
 pocket-handkerchief up to his face, and bursting with 
 laughter behind it. 
 
 " Who's the gal in green along with 'em, Cap'n? " he 
 asked of Strong. 
 
 " That's Miss Amory, Lady Clavering's daughter," 
 replied the Chevalier. 
 
 The Colonel could hardly contain himself for laugh- 
 ing.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 CONTAINS SOME BALL-PRACTISING 
 
 NDER some calico dra- 
 peries in the shady em- 
 brasure of a window, 
 Arthur Pendennis 
 chose to assume a very 
 gloomy and frowning 
 countenance, and to 
 watch Miss Bell dance 
 her first quadrille with 
 Mr. Pynsent for a 
 partner. Miss Laura's 
 face was beaming with 
 pleasure and good- 
 nature. The lights 
 and the crowd and 
 music excited her. As 
 she spread out her white robes, and performed her 
 part of the dance, smiling and happy, her brown 
 ringlets flowing back over her fair shoulders from her 
 honest rosy face, more than one gentleman in the room 
 admired and looked after her; and Lady Fogey, who 
 had a house in London, and gave herself no small airs 
 of fashion when in the country, asked of Lady Rock- 
 minster who the young person was, mentioned a reign- 
 ing beauty in London whom, in her ladyship's opinion, 
 Laura was rather like, and pronounced that she would 
 " do." 
 
 404
 
 PENDENNIS 405 
 
 Lady Rockminster would have been very much sur- 
 prised if any protege of hers would not " do," and won- 
 dered at Lady Fogey's impudence in judging upon the 
 point at all. She surveyed Laura with majestic glances 
 through her eye-glass. She was pleased with the girl's 
 artless looks, and gay innocent manner. Her manner is 
 very good, her ladyship thought. Her arms are rather 
 red, but that is a defect of her youth. Her ton is far 
 better than that of the little pert Miss Amory, who is 
 dancing opposite to her. 
 
 Miss Blanche was, indeed, the vis-a-vis of Miss Laura, 
 and smiled most killingly upon her dearest friend, and 
 nodded to her, and talked to her, when they met during 
 the quadrille evolutions, and patronised her a great deal. 
 Her shoulders were the whitest in the whole room : and 
 they were never easy in her frock for one single instant : 
 nor were her eyes, which rolled about incessantly: nor 
 was her little figure : it seemed to say to all the people, 
 " Come and look at me not at that pink, healthy, bounc- 
 ing country lass, Miss Bell, who scarcely knew how to 
 dance till I taught her. This is the true Parisian man- 
 ner this is the prettiest little foot in the room, and the 
 prettiest little chaussure, too. Look at it, Mr. Pynsent, 
 Look at it, Mr. Pendennis, you who are scowling behind 
 the curtain I know you are longing to dance with me." 
 
 Laura went on dancing, and keeping an attentive 
 eye upon Mr. Pen in the embrasure of the window. He 
 did not quit that retirement during the first quadrille, 
 nor until the second, when the good-natured Lady Clav- 
 ering beckoned to him to come up to her to the dais or 
 place of honour where the dowagers were, and whither 
 Pen went blushing and exceedingly awkward, as most 
 conceited young fellows are. He performed a haughty
 
 406 PENDEXNIS 
 
 salutation to Lady Rockminster, who hardly acknow- 
 ledged his bow, and then went and paid his respects to the 
 widow of the late Amory, who was splendid in diamonds, 
 velvet, lace, feathers, and all sorts of millinery and gold- 
 smith's ware. 
 
 Young Mr. Fogey, then in the fifth form at Eton, 
 and ardently expecting his beard and his commission 
 in a dragoon regiment, was the second partner who was 
 honoured with Miss Bell's hand. He was rapt in ad- 
 miration of that young lady. He thought he had never 
 seen so charming a creature. " I like you much better 
 than the French girl" (for this young gentleman had 
 been dancing with Miss Amory before) , he candidly said 
 to her. Laura laughed, and looked more' good-humoured 
 than ever; and in the midst of her laughter caught a 
 sight of Pen, and continued to laugh as he, on his side, 
 continued to look absurdly pompous and sulky. The 
 next dance was a waltz, and young Fogey thought, with 
 a sigh, that he did not know how to waltz, and vowed 
 he would have a master the next holidays. 
 
 Mr. Pynsent again claimed Miss Bell's hand for this 
 dance ; and Pen beheld her, in a fury, twirling round the 
 room, her waist encircled by the arm of that gentleman. 
 He never used to be angry before when, on summer 
 evenings, the chairs and tables being removed, and the 
 governess called down stairs to play the piano, he and 
 the Chevalier Strong (who was a splendid performer, 
 and could dance a British hornpipe, a German waltz, 
 or a Spanish fandango, if need were) , and the two young 
 ladies, Blanche and Laura, improvised little balls at 
 Clavering Park. Laura enjoyed this dancing so much, 
 and was so animated, that she even animated Mr. Pyn- 
 sent. Blanche, who could dance beautifully, had an
 
 PENDENNIS 407 
 
 unlucky partner, Captain Broadfoot, of the Dragoons, 
 then stationed at Chatteris. For Captain Broadfoot, 
 though devoting himself with great energy to the object 
 in view, could not get round in time : and, not having the 
 least ear for music, was unaware that his movements 
 were too slow. 
 
 So, in the waltz as in the quadrille, Miss Blanche saw 
 that her dear friend Laura had the honours of the dance, 
 and was by no means pleased with the latter's success. 
 After a couple of turns with the heavy dragoon, she 
 pleaded fatigue, and requested to be led back to her 
 place, near her mamma, to whom Pen was talking : and 
 she asked him why he had not asked her to waltz, and 
 had left her to the mercies of that great odious man in 
 spurs and a red coat? 
 
 " I thought spurs and scarlet were the most fascinat- 
 ing objects in the world to young ladies," Pen answered. 
 " I never should have dared to put my black coat in com- 
 petition with that splendid red jacket." 
 
 " You are very unkind and cruel and sulky and 
 naughty," said Miss Amory, with another shrug of the 
 shoulders. ' You had better go away. Your cousin is 
 looking at us over Mr. Pynsent's shoulder." 
 
 " Will you waltz with me? " said Pen. 
 
 " Not this waltz. I can't, having just sent away that 
 great hot Captain Broadfoot. Look at Mr. Pynsent, 
 did you ever see such a creature? But I will dance the 
 next waltz with you, and the quadrille too. I am prom- 
 ised, but I will tell Mr. Poole that I had forgotten my 
 engagement to you." 
 
 " Women forget very readily," Pendennis said. 
 
 " But they always come back, and are very repentant 
 and sorry for what they've done*" Blanche said. " See,
 
 408 PENDENNIS 
 
 here comes the Poker, and dear Laura leaning on him. 
 How pretty she looks ! " 
 
 Laura came up, and put out her hand to Pen, to 
 whom Pynsent made a sort of bow, appearing to be 
 not much more graceful than that domestic instrument 
 to which Miss Amory compared him. 
 
 But Laura's face was full of kindness. " I am so 
 glad you have come, dear Pen," she said. " I can speak 
 to you now. How is mamma? The three dances are 
 over, and I am engaged to you for the next, Pen." 
 
 " I have just engaged myself to Miss Amory," said 
 Pen ; and Miss Amory nodded her head, and made her 
 usual little curtsey. " I don't intend to give him up, 
 dearest Laura," she said. 
 
 ' Well, then, he'll waltz with me, dear Blanche," said 
 the other. " Won't you, Pen? " 
 
 " I promised to waltz with Miss Amory." 
 
 " Provoking! " said Laura, and making a curtsey in 
 her turn, she went and placed herself under the ample 
 wing of Lady Rockminster. 
 
 Pen was delighted with his mischief. The two pretti- 
 est girls in the room were quarrelling about him. He 
 flattered himself he had punished Miss Laura. He 
 leaned in a dandified air, with his elbow over the wall, 
 and talked to Blanche: he quizzed unmercifully all the 
 men in the room the heavy dragoons in their tight 
 jackets the country dandies in their queer attire the 
 strange toilettes of the ladies. One seemed to have a 
 bird's nest in her head ; another had six pounds of grapes 
 in her hair, besides her false pearls. " It's a coiffure of 
 almonds and raisins," said Pen, " and might be served 
 up for dessert." In a word, he was exceedingly satirical 
 and amusing.
 
 PENDENNIS 409 
 
 During the quadrille he carried on this kind of con- 
 versation with unflinching bitterness and vivacity, and 
 kept Blanche continually laughing, both at his wicked- 
 ness and jokes, which were good, and also because 
 Laura was again their vis-a-vis, and could see and hear 
 how merry and confidential they were. 
 
 " Arthur is charming to-night," she whispered to 
 Laura, across Cornet Perch's shell jacket, as Pen 
 was performing cavalier seul before them, drawling 
 through that figure with a thumb in the pocket of each 
 waistcoat. 
 
 ff Who? " said Laura. 
 
 " Arthur," answered Blanche, in French. " Oh, it's 
 such a pretty name! " And now the young ladies went 
 over to Pen's side, and Cornet Perch performed a pas 
 seul in his turn. He had no waistcoat pocket to put his 
 hands into, and they looked large and swollen as they 
 hung before him depending from the tight arms in the 
 jacket. 
 
 During the interval between the quadrille and the 
 succeeding waltz, Pen did not take any notice of Laura, 
 except to ask her whether her partner, Cornet Perch, 
 was an amusing youth, and whether she liked him so 
 well as her other partner, Mr. Pynsent. Having planted 
 which two daggers in Laura's bosom, Mr. Pendennis 
 proceeded to rattle on with Blanche Amory, and to make 
 jokes good or bad, but which were always loud. Laura 
 was at a loss to account for her cousin's sulky behaviour, 
 and ignorant in what she had offended him; however, 
 she was not angry in her turn at Pen's splenetic mood, for 
 she was the most good-natured and forgiving of women, 
 and besides, an exhibition of jealousy on a man's part 
 is not always disagreeable to a lady.
 
 410 PENDENNIS 
 
 As Pen could not dance with her, she was glad to take 
 up with the active Chevalier Strong, who was a still 
 better performer than Pen; and being very fond of 
 dancing, as every brisk and innocent young girl should 
 be, when the waltz music began she set off, and chose 
 to enjoy herself with all her heart. Captain Broadfoot 
 on this occasion occupied the floor in conjunction with 
 a lady of proportions scarcely inferior to his own; 
 Miss Roundle, a large young woman in a strawberry- 
 ice coloured crape dress, the daughter of the lady 
 with the grapes in her head, whose bunches Pen had 
 admired. 
 
 And now taking his time, and with his fair partner 
 Blanche hanging lovingly on the arm which encircled 
 her, Mr. Arthur Pendennis set out upon his waltzing 
 career, and felt, as he whirled round to the music, that he 
 and Blanche were performing very brilliantly indeed. 
 Very likely he looked to see if Miss Bell thought so too ; 
 but she did not or would not see him, and was always en- 
 gaged with her partner Captain Strong. But Pen's tri- 
 umph was not destined to last long: and it was doomed 
 that poor Blanche was to have yet another discomfiture 
 on that unfortunate night. While she and Pen were 
 whirling round as light and brisk as a couple of opera- 
 dancers, honest Captain Broadfoot and the lady round 
 whose large waist he was clinging, were twisting round 
 very leisurely according to their natures, and indeed were 
 in everybody's way. But they were more in Pendennis's 
 way than in anybody's else, for he and Blanche, whilst 
 executing their rapid gyrations, came bolt up against 
 the heavy dragoon and his lady, and with such force 
 that the centre of gravity was lost by all four of the 
 circumvolving bodies; Captain Broadfoot and Miss 
 Roundle were fairly upset, as was Pen himself, who was
 
 PENDENNIS 411 
 
 less lucky than his partner Miss Amory, who was only 
 thrown upon a bench against a wall. 
 
 But Pendennis came fairly down upon the floor, 
 sprawling in the general ruin with Broadfoot and Miss 
 Roundle. The Captain, though heavy, was good-na- 
 tured, and was the first to burst out into a loud laugh 
 at his own misfortune, which nobody therefore heeded. 
 But Miss Amory was savage at her mishap; Miss 
 Roundle placed on her scant, and looking pitifully 
 round, presented an object which very few people could 
 see without laughing; and Pen was furious when he 
 heard the people giggling about him. He was one of 
 those sarcastic young fellows that did not bear a laugh 
 at his own expense, and of all things in the world feared 
 ridicule most. 
 
 As he got up Laura and Strong were laughing at 
 him ; everybody was laughing ; Pynsent and his partner 
 were laughing; and Pen boiled with wrath against the 
 pair, and could have stabbed them both on the spot. 
 He turned away in a fury from them, and began blun- 
 dering out apologies to Miss Amory. It was the other 
 couple's fault the woman in pink had done it Pen 
 hoped Miss Amory was not hurt would she not have 
 the courage to take another turn? 
 
 Miss Amory in a pet said she was very much hurt 
 indeed, and she would not take another turn; and she 
 accepted with great thanks a glass of water which a cav- 
 alier, who wore a blue ribbon and a three-pointed star, 
 rushed to fetch for her when he had seen the deplorable 
 accident. She drank the water, smiled upon the bringer 
 gracefully, and turning her white shoulder at Mr. Pen 
 in the most marked and haughty manner, besought the 
 gentleman with the star to conduct her to her mamma; 
 and she held out her hand in order to take his arm.
 
 412 PENDENNIS 
 
 The man with the star trembled with delight at this 
 mark of her favour; he bowed over her hand, pressed 
 it to his coat fervidly, and looked round him with 
 triumph. 
 
 It was no other than the happy Mirobolant whom 
 Blanche had selected as an escort. But the truth is, that 
 the young lady had never fairly looked in the artist's 
 face since he had been employed in her mother's family, 
 and had no idea but it was a foreign nobleman on whose 
 arm she was leaning. As she went off, Pen forgot his 
 humiliation in his surprise, and cried out, " By Jove, it's 
 the cook!" 
 
 The instant he had uttered the words, he was sorry for 
 having spoken them for it was Blanche who had her- 
 self invited Mirobolant to escort her, nor could the artist 
 do otherwise than comply with a lady's command. 
 Blanche in her flutter did not hear what Arthur said; 
 but Mirobolant heard him, and cast a furious glance at 
 him over his shoulder, which rather amused Mr. Pen. 
 He was in a mischievous and sulky humour; wanting 
 perhaps to pick a quarrel with somebody; but the idea 
 of having insulted a cook, or that such an individual 
 should have any feeling of honour at all, did not much 
 enter into the mind of this lofty young aristocrat, the 
 apothecary's son. 
 
 It had never entered that poor artist's head, that he 
 as a man was not equal to any other mortal, or that there 
 was anything in his position so degrading as to prevent 
 him from giving his arm to a lady who asked for it. He 
 had seen in the fetes in his own country fine ladies, not 
 certainly demoiselles (but the demoiselle Anglaise he 
 knew was a great deal more free than the spinster in 
 France), join in the dance with Blaise or Pierre; and
 
 PENDENNIS 413 
 
 he would have taken Blanche up to Lady Clavering, 
 and possibly have asked her to dance too, but he heard 
 Pen's exclamation, which struck him as if it had shot 
 him, and cruelly humiliated and angered him. She did 
 not know what caused him to start, and to grind a Gas- 
 con oath between his teeth. 
 
 But Strong, who was acquainted with the poor fel- 
 low's state of mind, having had the interesting informa- 
 tion from our friend Madame Fribsby, was luckily in 
 the way when wanted, and saying something rapidly in 
 Spanish, which the other understood, the Chevalier 
 begged Miss Amory to come and take an ice before she 
 went back to Lady Clavering. Upon which the un- 
 happy Mirobolant relinquished the arm which he had 
 held for a minute, and with a most profound and piteous 
 bow, fell back. " Don't you know who it is? " Strong 
 asked of Miss Amory, as he led her away. " It is the 
 chef Mirobolant." 
 
 " How should I know? " asked Blanche. " He has 
 a croix; he is very distingue; he has beautiful eyes." 
 
 " The poor fellow is mad for your beaux yeux, I be- 
 lieve," Strong said. " He is a very good cook, but he 
 is not quite right in the head." 
 
 " What did you say to him in the unknown tongue? " 
 asked Miss Blanche. 
 
 " He is a Gascon, and comes from the borders of 
 Spain," Strong answered. " I told him he would lose 
 his place if he walked with you." 
 
 " Poor Monsieur Mirobolant ! " said Blanche. 
 
 " Did you see the look he gave Pendennis? " Strong 
 asked, enjoying the idea of the mischief- ' I think he 
 would like to run little Pen through with one of his 
 spits."
 
 414 PENDENNIS 
 
 " He is an odious, conceited, clumsy creature, that 
 Mr. Pen," said Blanche. 
 
 " Broadfoot looked as if he would like to kill him too, 
 so did Pynsent," Strong said. ' What ice will you 
 have water ice or cream ice? " 
 
 ' Water ice. Who is that odd man staring at me he 
 is decore too." 
 
 ' That is my friend Colonel Altamont, a very queer 
 character, in the service of the Nawaub of Lucknow. 
 Hallo! what's that noise? I'll be back in an instant," 
 said the Chevalier, and sprang out of the room to the 
 ball-room, where a scuffle and a noise of high voices was 
 heard. 
 
 The refreshment-room, in which Miss Amory now 
 found herself, was a room set apart for the purposes of 
 supper, which Mr. Rincer the landlord had provided 
 for those who chose to partake, at the rate of five shil- 
 lings per head. Also, refreshments of a superior class 
 were here ready for the ladies and gentlemen of the 
 county families who came to the ball; but the com- 
 moner sort of persons were kept out of the room by a 
 waiter who stood at the portal, and who said that was 
 a select room for Lady Clavering and Lady Rockmin- 
 ster's parties, and not to be opened to the public till 
 supper-time, which was not to be until past midnight. 
 Pynsent, who danced with his constituents' daughters, 
 took them and their mammas in for their refreshment 
 there. Strong, who was manager and master of the 
 revels wherever he went, had of course the entree and 
 the only person who was now occupying the room, was 
 the gentleman with the black wig and the orders in his 
 button-hole; the officer in the service of his Highness 
 the Xawaub of Lucknow.
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 415 
 
 This gentleman had established himself very early 
 in the evening in this apartment, where, saying he was 
 confoundedly thirsty, he called for a bottle of cham- 
 
 pagne. At this order, the waiter instantly supposed 
 that he had to do with a grandee, and the Colonel sate 
 down and began to eat his supper and absorb his drink, 
 and enter affably into conversation with anybody who 
 entered the room. 
 
 Sir Francis Clavering and Mr. Wagg found him 
 there; when they left the ball-room, which they did
 
 416 PENDENNIS 
 
 pretty early Sir Francis to go and smoke a cigar, and 
 look at the people gathered outside the ball-room on the 
 shore, which he declared was much better fun than to 
 remain within; Mr. Wagg to hang on to a Baronet's 
 arm, as he was always pleased to do on the arm of the 
 greatest man in the company. Colonel Altamont had 
 stared at these gentlemen in so odd a manner, as they 
 passed through the " Select " room, that Clavering made 
 inquiries of the landlord who he was, and hinted a strong 
 opinion that the officer of the Nawaub's service was 
 drunk. 
 
 Mr. Pynsent, too, had had the honour of a conversa- 
 tion with the servant of the Indian potentate. It was 
 Pynsent's cue to speak to everybody; (which he did, to 
 do him justice, in the most ungracious manner;) and he 
 took the gentleman in the black wig for some constitu- 
 ent, some merchant captain, or other outlandish man 
 of the place. Mr. Pynsent, then, coming into the re- 
 freshment-room with a lady, the wife of a constituent, 
 on his arm, the Colonel asked him if he would try a glass 
 of Sham? Pynsent took it with great gravity, bowed, 
 tasted the wine, and pronounced it excellent, and with 
 the utmost politeness retreated before Colonel Altamont. 
 This gravity and decorum routed and surprised the 
 Colonel more than any other kind of behaviour proba- 
 bly would: he stared after Pynsent stupidly, and pro- 
 nounced to the landlord over the counter that he was a 
 rum one. Mr. Rincer blushed, and hardly knew what 
 to say. Mr. Pynsent was a county Earl's grandson, 
 going to set up as a Parliament man. Colonel Alta- 
 mont, on the other hand, wore orders and diamonds, 
 jingled sovereigns constantly in his pocket, and paid his 
 way like a man ; so not knowing what to say, Mr. Rincer
 
 PENDENNIS 417 
 
 said, " Yes, Colonel yes, ma'am, did you say tea? Cup 
 a tea for Mr. Jones, Mrs. R.," and so got off that dis- 
 cussion regarding Mr. Pynsent's qualities, into which 
 the Nizam's officer appeared inclined to enter. 
 
 In fact, if the truth must be told, Mr. Altamont, hav- 
 ing remained at the buffet almost all night, and em- 
 ployed himself very actively whilst there, had consid- 
 erably flushed his brain by drinking, and he was still 
 going on drinking, when Mr. Strong and Miss Amory 
 entered the room. 
 
 When the Chevalier ran out of the apartment, at- 
 tracted by the noise in the dancing-room, the Colonel 
 rose from his chair with his little red eyes glowing like 
 coals, and, with rather an unsteady gait, advanced 
 towards Blanche, who was sipping her ice. She was 
 absorbed in absorbing it, for it was very fresh and good ; 
 or she was not curious to know what was going on in 
 the adjoining room, although the waiters were, who ran 
 after Chevalier Strong. So that when she looked up 
 from her glass, she beheld this strange man staring at 
 her out of his little red eyes. ' Who was he? It was 
 quite exciting." 
 
 " And so you're Betsy Amory," said he, after gazing 
 at her. " Betsy Amory, by Jove! " 
 
 ' Who who speaks to me? " said Betsy, alias 
 Blanche. 
 
 But the noise in the ball-room is really becoming so 
 loud, that we must rush back thither, and see what is 
 the cause of the disturbance.
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 WHICH IS BOTH QUARRELSOME AND SENTIMENTAL 
 
 'IVIL war was raging, high 
 words passing, people push- 
 ing and squeezing to- 
 gether in an unseemly 
 manner, round a win- 
 dow in the corner of 
 the ball-room, close 
 by the door through 
 which the Chevalier 
 Strong shouldered his 
 way. Through the 
 opened window, the 
 crowd in the street 
 below was sending up 
 
 sarcastic remarks, such as " Pitch into him! " ' Where's 
 the police?" and the like; and a ring of individuals, 
 among whom Madame Fribsby was conspicuous, was 
 gathered round Monsieur Alcide Mirobolant on the one 
 side; whilst several gentlemen and ladies surrounded 
 our friend Arthur Pendennis on the other. Strong 
 penetrated into this assembly, elbowing by Madame 
 Fribsby, who was charmed at the Chevalier's appear- 
 ance, and cried, " Save him, save him!" in frantic and 
 pathetic accents. 
 
 418
 
 PENDENNIS 419 
 
 The cause of the disturbance, it appeared, was the 
 angry little chef of Sir Francis Clavering's culinary 
 establishment. Shortly after Strong had quitted the 
 room, and whilst Mr. Pen, greatly irate at his down- 
 fall in the waltz, which had made him look ridiculous in 
 the eyes of the nation, and by Miss Amory's behaviour 
 to him, which had still further insulted his dignity, was 
 endeavouring to get some coolness of body and temper, 
 by looking out of window towards the sea, which was 
 sparkling in the distance, and murmuring in a won- 
 derful calm whilst he was really trying to compose 
 himself, and owning to himself, perhaps, that he had 
 acted in a very absurd and peevish manner during the 
 night he felt a hand upon his shoulder; and, on look- 
 ing round, beheld, to his utter surprise and horror, that 
 the hand in question belonged to Monsieur Mirobolant, 
 whose eyes were glaring out of his pale face and ring- 
 lets at Mr. Pen. To be tapped on the shoulder by a 
 French cook was a piece of familiarity which made the 
 blood of the Pendennises to boil up in the veins of their 
 descendant, and he was astounded, almost more than 
 enraged, at such an indignity. 
 
 ' You speak French? " Mirobolant said in his own 
 language, to Pen. 
 
 ' What is that to you, pray? " said Pen, in English. 
 
 "At any rate, you understand it?" continued the 
 other, with a bow. 
 
 * Yes, sir," said Pen, with a stamp of his foot; " I 
 understand it pretty well." 
 
 ' Vous me comprendrez alors, Monsieur Pendennis," 
 replied the other, rolling out his r with Gascon force, 
 " quand je vous dis que vous etes un lache. Monsieur 
 Pendennis un lache, entendez-vous? "
 
 420 PENDENNIS 
 
 'What?" said Pen, starting round on him. 
 
 ' You understand the meaning of the word and its 
 consequences among men of honour? " the artist said, 
 putting his hand on his hip, and staring at Pen. 
 
 ' The consequences are, that I will fling you out of 
 window, you impudent scoundrel," bawled out Mr. 
 Pen; and darting upon the Frenchman, he would very 
 likely have put his threat into execution, for the window 
 was at hand, and the artist by no means a match for the 
 young gentleman had not Captain Broadfoot and 
 another heavy officer flung themselves between the com- 
 batants, had not the ladies begun to scream, had not 
 the fiddles stopped, had not the crowd of people come 
 running in that direction, had not Laura, with a face 
 of great alarm, looked over their heads and asked for 
 Heaven's sake what was wrong had not the opportune 
 Strong made his appearance from the refreshment- 
 room, and found Alcide grinding his teeth and jabber- 
 ing oaths in his Gascon French, and Pen looking un- 
 commonly wicked, although trying to appear as calm 
 as possible, when the ladies and the crowd came up. 
 
 ' What has happened ? " Strong asked of the chef, in 
 Spanish. 
 
 " I am Chevalier de Juillet," said the other, slapping 
 his breast, " and he has insulted me." 
 
 ' What has he said to you? " asked Strong. 
 
 " II m'a appele Cummer " hissed out the little 
 Frenchman. 
 
 Strong could hardly help laughing. " Come away 
 with me, my poor Chevalier," he said. ' We must not 
 quarrel before ladies. Come away; I will carry your 
 message to Mr. Pendennis. The poor fellow is not 
 right in his head," he whispered to one or two people
 
 PENDENNIS 421 
 
 about him; and others, and anxious Laura's face visi- 
 ble amongst these, gathered round Pen and asked the 
 cause of the disturbance. 
 
 Pen did not know. ' The man was going to give his 
 arm to a young lady, on which I said that he was a cook, 
 and the man called me a coward and challenged me to 
 fight. I own I was so surprised and indignant, that 
 if you gentlemen had not stopped me, I should have 
 thrown him out of window," Pen said. 
 
 " D - him, serve him right, too, the d - impu- 
 dent foreign scoundrel," the gentlemen said. 
 
 " I I'm very sorry if I hurt his feelings, though," 
 Pen added: and Laura was glad to hear him say that; 
 although some of the young bucks said, " No, hang the 
 fellow, hang those impudent foreigners little thrash- 
 ing would do them good." 
 
 " You will go and shake hands with him before you 
 go to sleep won't you, Pen? " said Laura, coming up 
 to him. " Foreigners may be more susceptible than we 
 are, and have different manners. If you hurt a poor 
 man's feelings, I am sure you would be the first to ask 
 his pardon. Wouldn't you, dear Pen? " 
 
 She looked all forgiveness and gentleness, like an 
 angel, as she spoke, and Pen took both her hands, and 
 looked into her kind face, and said indeed he would. 
 
 " How fond that girl is of me! " he thought, as she 
 stood gazing at him. " Shall I speak to her now? No 
 not now. I must have this absurd business with the 
 Frenchman over." 
 
 Laura asked Wouldn't he stop and dance with her? 
 She was as anxious to keep him in the room, as he to 
 quit it. " Won't you stop and waltz with me, Pen? 
 I'm not afraid to waltz with you.*'
 
 422 PENDENNIS 
 
 This was an affectionate, but an unlucky speech. 
 Pen saw himself prostrate on the ground, having tum- 
 bled over Miss Roundle and the dragoon, and flung 
 Blanche up against the wall saw himself on the 
 ground, and all the people laughing at him, Laura and 
 Pynsent amongst them. 
 
 ' I shall never dance again," he replied, with a dark 
 and determined face. " Never. I'm surprised you 
 should ask me." 
 
 " Is it because you can't get Blanche for a partner? " 
 asked Laura, with a wicked, unlucky captiousness. 
 
 " Because I don't wish to make a fool of myself, for 
 other people to laugh at me," Pen answered " for you 
 to laugh at me, Laura. I saw you and Pynsent. By 
 Jove! no man shall laugh at me." 
 
 " Pen, Pen, don't be so wicked ! " cried out the poor 
 girl, hurt at the morbid perverseness and savage vanity 
 of Pen. He was glaring round in the direction of Mr. 
 Pynsent as if he would have liked to engage that gen- 
 tleman as he had done the cook. ' Who thinks the 
 worse of you for stumbling in a waltz? If Blanche 
 does, we don't. Why are you so sensitive, and ready 
 to think evil? " 
 
 Here again, by ill luck, Mr. Pynsent came up to 
 Laura, and said, " I have it in command from Lady 
 Rockminster to ask whether I may take you in to 
 supper? " 
 
 " I I was going in with my cousin," Laura said. 
 
 " O pray, no! " said Pen. ' You are in such good 
 hands, that I can't do better than leave you: and I'm 
 going home." 
 
 " Good night, Mr. Pendennis," Pynsent said, drily 
 to which speech (which, in fact, meant, " Go to the
 
 PENDENNIS 423 
 
 deuce for an insolent, jealous, impertinent jackanapes, 
 whose ears I should like to box") Mr. Pendennis did 
 not vouchsafe any reply, except a bow: and, in spite of 
 Laura's imploring looks, he left the room. 
 
 " How beautifully calm and bright the night outside 
 is ! " said Mr. Pynsent ; " and what a murmur the sea is 
 making! It would be pleasanter to be walking on the 
 beach, than in this hot room." 
 
 ' Very," said Laura. 
 
 ' What a strange congregation of people," con- 
 tinued Pynsent. " I have had to go up and perform 
 the agreeable to most of them the attorney's daugh- 
 tersthe apothecary's wife I scarcely know whom. 
 There was a man in the refreshment-room who in- 
 sisted upon treating me to champagne a seafaring 
 looking man extraordinarily dressed, and seeming 
 half tipsy. As a public man, one is bound to conciliate 
 all these people, but it is a hard task especially when 
 one would so very much like to be elsewhere " and he 
 blushed rather as he spoke. 
 
 " I beg your pardon," said Laura "I I was not 
 listening. Indeed I was frightened about that quar- 
 rel between my cousin and that that French person." 
 
 " Your cousin has been rather unlucky to-night," 
 Pynsent said. ' There are three or four persons whom 
 he has not succeeded in pleasing Captain Broadwood; 
 what is his name the officer and the young lady in 
 red with whom he danced and Miss Blanche and the 
 poor chef and I don't think he seemed to be particu- 
 larly pleased with me." 
 
 " Didn't he leave me in charge to you? " Laura said, 
 looking up into Mr. Pynsent's face, and dropping her 
 eyes instantly, like a guilty little story-telling coquette.
 
 424 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Indeed, I can forgive him a good deal for that," 
 Pynsent eagerly cried out, and she took his arm, and 
 he led off his little prize in the direction of the supper- 
 room. 
 
 She had no great desire for that repast, though it 
 was served in Rincer's well-known style, as the county 
 paper said, giving an account of the entertainment af- 
 terwards; indeed, she was very distraite; and exceed- 
 ingly pained and unhappy about Pen. Captious and 
 quarrelsome; jealous and selfish; fickle and violent and 
 unjust when his anger led him astray; how could her 
 mother (as indeed Helen had by a thousand words and 
 hints) ask her to give her heart to such a man? and 
 suppose she were to do so, would it make him happy? 
 
 But she got some relief at length, when, at the end 
 of half an hour a long half -hour it had seemed to her 
 a waiter brought her a little note in pencil from Pen, 
 who said, " I met Cooky below ready to fight me; and 
 I asked his pardon. I'm glad I did it. I wanted to 
 speak to you to-night, but will keep what I had to say 
 till you come home. God bless you. Dance away all 
 night with Pynsent, and be very happy. PEN."- 
 Laura was very thankful for this letter, and to think 
 that there was goodness and forgiveness still in her 
 mother's boy. 
 
 Pen went down stairs, his heart reproaching him for 
 his absurd behaviour to Laura, whose gentle and im- 
 ploring looks followed and rebuked him; and he was 
 scarcely out of the ball-room door before he longed to 
 turn back and ask her pardon. But he remembered 
 that he had left her with that confounded Pynsent. 
 He could not apologise before him. He would com-
 
 PENDENNIS 425 
 
 promise and forget his wrath, and make his peace with 
 the Frenchman. 
 
 The Chevalier was pacing down below in the hall of 
 the inn when Pen descended from the ball-room; and 
 he came up to Pen, with all sorts of fun and mischief 
 lighting up his jolly face. 
 
 " I have got him in the coffee-room," he said, " with 
 a brace of pistols and a candle. Or would you like 
 swords on the beach? Mirobolant is a dead hand with 
 the foils, and killed four gardes-du-corps with his own 
 point in the barricades of July." 
 
 " Confound it," said Pen, in a fury, " I can't fight 
 a cook! " 
 
 " He is a Chevalier of July," replied the other. 
 " They present arms to him in his own country." 
 
 " And do you ask me, Captain Strong, to go out 
 with a servant?" Pen asked fiercely; "I'll call a po- 
 liceman for him; but but " 
 
 'You'll invite me to hair triggers?" cried Strong, 
 with a laugh. * Thank you for nothing; I was but jok- 
 ing. I came to settle quarrels, not to fight them. I 
 have been soothing down Mirobolant; I have told him 
 that you did not apply the word 'Cook' to him in an 
 offensive sense: that it was contrary to all the customs 
 of the country that a hired officer of a household, as 
 I called it, should give his arm to the daughter of the 
 house." And then he told Pen the grand secret which 
 he had had from Madame Fribsby, of the violent pas- 
 sion under which the poor artist was labouring. 
 
 When Arthur heard this tale, he broke out into a 
 hearty laugh, in which Strong joined, and his rage 
 against the poor cook vanished at once. He had been 
 absurdly jealous himself all the evening, and had
 
 420 PENDENNIS 
 
 longed for a pretext to insult Pynsent. He remem- 
 bered how jealous he had been of Oaks in his first af- 
 fair; he was ready to pardon anything to a man under 
 a passion like that: and he went into the coffee-room 
 where Mirobolant was waiting, with an outstretched 
 hand, and made him a speech in French, in which he 
 declared that he was "Sincerement fache d'avoir use 
 une expression qui avoit pu blesser Monsieur Mirobo- 
 lant, et qu'il donnoit sa parole comme un gentilhomme 
 qu'il ne 1'avoit jamais, jamais intende," said Pen, 
 who made a shot at a French word for " intended," and 
 was secretly much pleased with his own fluency and cor- 
 rectness in speaking that language. 
 
 " Bravo, bravo! " cried Strong, as much amused with 
 Pen's speech as pleased by his kind manner. " And the 
 Chevalier Mirobolant of course withdraws, and sin- 
 cerely regrets the expression of which he made use." 
 
 " Monsieur Pendennis has disproved my words him- 
 self," said Alcide with great politeness; "he has shown 
 that he is a galant homme." 
 
 And so they shook hands and parted, Arthur in the 
 first place dispatching his note to Laura before he and 
 Strong committed themselves to the Butcher Boy. 
 
 As they drove along, Strong complimented Pen 
 upon his behaviour, as well as upon his skill in French. 
 ' You're a good fellow, Pendennis, and you speak 
 French like Chateaubriand, by Jove." 
 
 " I've been accustomed to it from my youth up- 
 wards," said Pen; and Strong had the grace not to 
 laugh for five minutes, when he exploded into fits of 
 hilarity which Pendennis has never, perhaps, under- 
 stood up to this day. 
 
 It was daybreak when they got to the Brawl, where
 
 PENDENNIS 427 
 
 they separated. By that time the ball at Baymouth 
 was over too. Madame Fribsby and Mirobolant were 
 on their way home in the Clavering fly; Laura was in 
 bed with an easy heart and asleep at Lady Rockmin- 
 ster's; and the Claverings at rest at the inn at Bay- 
 mouth, where they had quarters for the night. A short 
 time after the disturbance between Pen and the chef, 
 Blanche had come out of the refreshment-room, look- 
 ing as pale as a lemon-ice. She told her maid, having 
 no other confidante at hand, that she had met with the 
 most romantic adventure the most singular man- 
 one who had known the author of her being her per- 
 secuted her unhappy her heroic her murdered fa- 
 ther; and she began a sonnet to his manes before she 
 went to sleep. 
 
 So Pen returned to Fairoaks, in company with his 
 friend the Chevalier, without having uttered a word 
 of the message which he had been so anxious to deliver 
 to Laura at Baymouth. He could wait, however, until 
 her return home, which was to take place on the suc- 
 ceeding day. He was not seriously jealous of the 
 progress made by Mr. Pynsent in her favour; and he 
 felt pretty certain that in this, as in any other family 
 arrangement, he had but to ask and have, and Laura, 
 like his mother, could refuse him nothing. 
 
 When Helen's anxious looks inquired of him what 
 had happened at Baymouth, and whether her darling 
 project was fulfilled, Pen, in a gay tone, told of the 
 calamity which had befallen; laughingly said, that no 
 man could think about declarations under such a mis- 
 hap, and made light of the matter. " There will be 
 plenty of time for sentiment, dear mother, when Laura
 
 428 PENDENNIS 
 
 comes back," he said, and he looked in the glass with a 
 killing air, and his mother put his hair off his fore- 
 head and kissed him, and of course thought, for her 
 part, that no woman could resist him; and was exceed- 
 ingly happy that day. 
 
 When he was not with her, Mr. Pen occupied him- 
 self in packing books and portmanteaus, burning and 
 arranging papers, cleaning his gun and putting it into 
 its case: in fact, in making dispositions for departure. 
 For though he was ready to marry, this gentleman was 
 eager to go to London too, rightly considering that at 
 three-and-twenty it was quite time for him to begin 
 upon the serious business of life, and to set about mak- 
 ing a fortune as quickly as possible. 
 
 The means to this end he had already shaped out for 
 himself. " I shall take chambers," he said, " and enter 
 myself at an Inn of Court. With a couple of hundred 
 pounds I shall be able to carry through the first year 
 very well; after that I have little doubt my pen will 
 support me, as it is doing with several Oxbridge men 
 now in town. I have a tragedy, a comedy, and a 
 novel, all nearly finished, and for which I can't fail to 
 get a price. And so I shall be able to live pretty well, 
 without drawing upon my poor mother, until I have 
 made my way at the bar. Then, some day I will come 
 back and make her dear soul happy by marrying 
 Laura. She is as good and as sweet-tempered a girl 
 as ever lived, besides being really very good-looking, 
 and the engagement will serve to steady me, won't it, 
 Ponto?" Thus, smoking his pipe, and talking to his 
 dog as he sauntered through the gardens and orchards 
 of the little domain of Fairoaks, this young day- 
 dreamer built castles in the air for himself: " Yes,
 
 PENDENNIS 429 
 
 she'll steady me, won't she? And you'll miss me, when 
 I've gone, won't you, old boy? " he asked of Ponto, 
 who quivered his tail and thrust his brown nose into his 
 master's fist. Ponto licked his hand and shoe, as they 
 all did in that house, and Mr. Pen received their hom- 
 age as other folks do the flattery which they get. 
 
 Laura came home rather late in the evening of the 
 second day ; and Mr. Pynsent, as ill luck would have it, 
 drove her from Clavering. The poor girl could not 
 refuse his offer, but his appearance brought a dark 
 cloud upon the brow of Arthur Pendennis. Laura saw 
 this, and was pained by it: the eager widow, however, 
 was aware of nothing, and being anxious, doubtless, 
 that the delicate question should be asked at once, was 
 for going to bed very soon after Laura's arrival, and 
 rose for that purpose to leave the sofa where she now 
 generally lay, and where Laura would come and sit 
 and work or read by her. But when Helen rose, Laura 
 said, with a blush and rather an alarmed voice, that she 
 was also very tired and wanted to go to bedt so that 
 the widow was disappointed in her scheme for that 
 night at least, and Mr. Pen was left another day in sus- 
 pense regarding his fate. 
 
 His dignity was offended at being thus obliged to 
 remain in the ante-chamber when he wanted an audi- 
 ence. Such a sultan as he, could not afford to be kept 
 waiting. However, he went to bed and slept upon his 
 disappointment pretty comfortably, and did not wake 
 until the early morning, when he looked up and saw his 
 mother standing in his room. 
 
 " Dear Pen, rouse up," said this lady. " Do not be 
 lazy. It is the most beautiful morning in the world. I
 
 430 PENDENNIS 
 
 have not been able to sleep since day-break ; and Laura 
 has been out for an hour. She is in the garden. 
 Everybody ought to be in the garden and out on such 
 a morning as this." 
 
 Pen laughed. He saw what thoughts were upper- 
 most in the simple woman's heart. His good-natured 
 laughter cheered the widow. " Oh you profound dis- 
 sembler," he said, kissing his mother. " Oh you artful 
 creature ! Can nobody escape from your wicked tricks ? 
 and will you make your only son your victim? " Helen 
 too laughed, she blushed, she fluttered, and was agi- 
 tated. She was as happy as she could be a good ten- 
 der, matchmaking woman, the dearest project of whose 
 heart was about to be accomplished. 
 
 So, after exchanging some knowing looks and hasty 
 words, Helen left Arthur; and this young hero, rising 
 from his bed, proceeded to decorate his beautiful per- 
 son, and shave his ambrosial chin; and in half-an-hour 
 he issued out from his apartment into the garden in 
 quest of Laura. His reflections as he made his toilette 
 were rather dismal. " I am going to tie myself for 
 life," he thought, " to please my mother. Laura is the 
 best of women, and and she has given me her money. 
 I wish to Heaven I had not received it; I wish I had 
 not this duty to perform just yet. But as both the 
 women have set their hearts on the match, why I sup- 
 pose I must satisfy them and now for it. A man may 
 do worse than make happy two of the best creatures 
 in the world." So Pen, now he was actually come to 
 the point, felt very grave, and by no means elated, and, 
 indeed, thought it was a great sacrifice he was going to 
 perform. 
 
 It was Miss Laura's custom, upon her garden ex-
 
 PENDENNIS 431 
 
 cursions, to wear a sort of uniform, which, though 
 homely, was thought by many people to be not unbe- 
 coming. She had a large straw hat, with a streamer of 
 broad ribbon, which was useless probably, but the hat 
 sufficiently protected the owner's pretty face from the 
 sun. Over her accustomed gown she wore a blouse or 
 pinafore, which, being fastened round her little waist 
 by a smart belt, looked extremely well, and her hands 
 were guaranteed from the thorns of her favourite rose- 
 bushes by a pair of gauntlets, which gave this young 
 lady a military and resolute air. 
 
 Somehow she had the very same smile with which she 
 had laughed at him on the night previous, and the rec- 
 ollection of his disaster again offended Pen. But 
 Laura, though she saw him coming down the walk 
 looking so gloomy and full of care, accorded to him a 
 smile of the most perfect and provoking good-humour, 
 and went to meet him, holding one of the gauntlets to 
 him, so that he might shake it if he liked and Mr. Pen 
 condescended to do so. His face, however, did not lose 
 its tragic expression in consequence of this favour, and 
 he continued to regard her with a dismal and solemn 
 air. 
 
 " Excuse my glove," said Laura, with a laugh, press- 
 ing Pen's hand kindly with it. ' We are not angry 
 again, are we, Pen? " 
 
 " Why do you laugh at me? " said Pen. " You did 
 the other night, and made a fool of me to the people at 
 Bay mouth." 
 
 " My dear Arthur, I meant you no wrong," the girl 
 answered. ' You and Miss Roundle looked so droll as 
 you as you met with your little accident, that I could 
 not make a tragedy of it. Dear Pen, it wasn't a serious
 
 432 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 fall. And, besides, it was Miss Roundle who was the 
 most unfortunate." 
 
 " Confound Miss Roundle!" bellowed out Pen. 
 
 " I'm sure she looked so,*' said Laura, archly. ' You 
 were up in an instant; but that poor lady sitting on the 
 ground in her red crape dress, and looking about her 
 with that piteous face can I ever forget her? " and 
 Laura began to make a face in imitation of Miss 
 Roundle's under the disaster, but she checked herself re-
 
 PENDENNIS 433 
 
 pentantly, saying, " Well, we must not laugh at her, 
 but I am sure we ought to laugh at you, Pen, if you 
 were angry about such a trifle." 
 
 " You should not laugh at me, Laura," said Pen, 
 with some bitterness; "not you, of all people." 
 
 " And why not? Are you such a great man? " asked 
 Laura. 
 
 "Ah, no, Laura, I'm such a poor one," Pen answered. 
 " Haven't you baited me enough already? " 
 
 " My dear Pen, and how? " cried Laura. " Indeed, 
 indeed, I didn't think to vex you by such a trifle. I 
 thought such a clever man as you could bear a harmless 
 little joke from his sister," she said, holding her hand 
 out again. " Dear Arthur, if I have hurt you, I beg 
 your pardon." 
 
 "It is your kindness that humiliates me more even 
 than your laughter, Laura," Pen said. * You are al- 
 ways my superior." 
 
 'What! superior to the great Arthur Pendennis? 
 How can it be possible? " said Miss Laura, who may 
 have had a little wickedness as well as a great deal of 
 kindness in her composition. * You can't mean that 
 any woman is your equal? " 
 
 ' Those who confer benefits should not sneer," said 
 Pen. " I don't like my benefactor to laugh at me, 
 Laura; it makes the obligation very hard to bear. You 
 scorn me because I have taken your money, and I am 
 worthy to be scorned ; but the blow is hard coming from 
 
 you." 
 
 " Money! Obligation! For shame, Pen; this is un- 
 generous," Laura said, flushing red. " May not our 
 mother claim everything that belongs to us? Don't I 
 owe her all my happiness in this .world, Arthur? What
 
 434 PENDENNIS 
 
 matters about a few paltry guineas, if we can set her 
 tender heart at rest, and ease her mind regarding you? 
 I would dig in the fields, I would go out and be a servant 
 -I would die for her. You know I would," said Miss 
 Laura, kindling up ; " and you call this paltry money an 
 obligation? Oh, Pen, it's cruel it's unworthy of you to 
 take it so! If my brother may not share with me my 
 superfluity, who may? Mine? I tell you it was not 
 mine; it was all mamma's to do with as she chose, and 
 so is everything I have," said Laura; " my life is hers." 
 And the enthusiastic girl looked towards the windows 
 of the widow's room, and blessed in her heart the kind 
 creature within. 
 
 Helen was looking, unseen, out of that window 
 towards which Laura's eyes and heart were turned as 
 she spoke, and was watching her two children with the 
 deepest interest and emotion, longing and hoping that 
 the prayer of her life might be fulfilled; and if Laura 
 had spoken as Helen hoped, who knows what tempta- 
 tions Arthur Pendennis might have been spared, or 
 what different trials he would have had to undergo? 
 He might have remained at Fairoaks all his days, and 
 died a country gentleman. But would he have escaped 
 then? Temptation is an obsequious servant that has 
 no objection to the country, and we know that it takes 
 up its lodging in hermitages as well as in cities; and 
 that in the most remote and inaccessible desert it keeps 
 company with the fugitive solitary. 
 
 " Is your life my mother's," said Pen, beginning to 
 tremble, and speak in a very agitated manner. ' You 
 know, Laura, what the great object of hers is? " And 
 he took her hand once more. 
 
 ' What, Arthur? " she said, dropping it, and looking
 
 PENDENNIS 435 
 
 at him, at the window again, and then dropping her 
 eyes to the ground, so that they avoided Pen's gaze. 
 She, too, trembled, for she felt that the crisis for which 
 she had been secretly preparing was come. 
 
 " Our mother has one wish above all others in the 
 world, Laura," Pen said, " and I think you know it. 
 I own to you that she has spoken to me of it; and if 
 you will fulfil it, dear sister, I am ready. I am but 
 very young as yet; but I have had so many pains and 
 disappointments, that I am old and weary. I think I 
 have hardly got a heart to offer. Before I have almost 
 begun the race in life, I am a tired man. My career 
 has been a failure ; I have been protected by those whom 
 I by right should have protected. I own that your 
 nobleness and generosity, dear Laura, shame me, whilst 
 they render me grateful. When I heard from our 
 mother what you had done for me: that it was you who 
 armed me and bade me go out for one struggle more; 
 I longed to go and throw myself at your feet, and say, 
 * Laura, will you come and share the contest with me? 
 Your sympathy will cheer me while it lasts. I shall 
 have one of the tenderest and most generous creatures 
 under heaven to aid and bear me company.' Will you 
 take me, dear Laura, and make our mother happy? " 
 
 " Do you think mamma would be happy if you were 
 otherwise, Arthur? " Laura said in a low sad voice. 
 
 " And why should I not be," asked Pen eagerly, 
 "with so dear a creature as you by my side? I have 
 not my first love to give you. I am a broken man. But 
 indeed I would love you fondly and truly. I have lost 
 many an illusion and ambition, but I am not without 
 hope still. Talents I know I have, wretchedly as I have 
 misapplied them: they may serve me yet: they would,
 
 436 PENDENNIS 
 
 had I a motive for action. Let me go away and think 
 that I am pledged to return to you. Let me go and 
 work, and hope that you will share my success if I gain 
 it. You have given me so much, dear Laura, will you 
 take from me nothing? " 
 
 ' What have you got to give, Arthur? " Laura said, 
 with a grave sadness of tone, which made Pen start, 
 and see that his words had committed him. Indeed, his 
 declaration had not been such as he would have made it 
 two days earlier, when, full of hope and gratitude, he 
 had run over to Laura, his liberatress, to thank her for 
 his recovered freedom. Had he been permitted to 
 speak then, he had spoken, and she, perhaps, had lis- 
 tened differently. It would have been a grateful heart 
 asking for hers ; not a weary one offered to her, to take 
 or to leave. Laura was offended with the terms in 
 which Pen offered himself to her. He had, in fact, said 
 that he had no love, and yet would take no denial. " I 
 give myself to you to please my mother," he had said: 
 " take me, as she wishes that I should make this sacri- 
 fice." The girl's spirit would brook a husband under 
 no such conditions: she was not minded to run forward 
 because Pen chose to hold out the handkerchief, and her 
 tone, in reply to Arthur, showed her determination to 
 be independent. 
 
 " No, Arthur," she said, " our marriage would not 
 make mamma happy, as she fancies; for it would not 
 content you very long. I, too, have known what her 
 wishes were; for she is too open to conceal anything 
 she has at heart: and once, perhaps, I thought but 
 that is over now that I could have made you that 
 it might have been as she wished." 
 
 " You have seen somebody else," said Pen, angry
 
 PENDENNIS 437 
 
 at her tone, and recalling the incidents of the past 
 days. 
 
 " That allusion might have been spared," Laura re- 
 plied, flinging up her head. " A heart which has worn 
 out love at three-and-twenty, as yours has, you say, 
 should have survived jealousy too. I do not condescend 
 to say whether I have seen or encouraged any other per- 
 son. I shall neither admit the charge, nor deny it: and 
 beg you also to allude to it no more." 
 
 " I ask your pardon, Laura, if I have offended you: 
 but if I am jealous, does it not prove that I have a 
 heart? " 
 
 " Not for me, Arthur. Perhaps you think you love 
 me now: but it is only for an instant, and because you 
 are foiled. Were there no obstacle, you would feel no 
 ardour to overcome it. No, Arthur, you don't love me. 
 You would weary of me in three months, as as you do 
 of most things; and mamma, seeing you tired of me, 
 would be more unhappy than at my refusal to be yours. 
 Let us be brother and sister, Arthur, as heretofore but 
 no more. You will get over this little disappointment." 
 
 " I will try," said Arthur, in a great indignation. 
 
 " Have you not tried before? " Laura said, with some 
 anger, for she had been angry with Arthur for a very 
 long time, and was now determined, I suppose, to speak 
 her mind. " And the next time, Arthur, when you offer 
 yourself to a woman, do not say as you have done to me, 
 ' I have no heart I do not love you; but I am ready to 
 marry you because my mother wishes for the match.' 
 We require more than this in return for our love that 
 is, I think so. I have had no experience hitherto, and 
 have not had the the practice which you supposed me 
 to have, when you spoke but now of my having seen
 
 438 PENDENNIS 
 
 somebody else. Did you tell your first love that 
 you had no heart, Arthur? or your second that you 
 did not love her, but that she might have you if she 
 liked?" 
 
 ' What what do you mean? " asked Arthur, blush- 
 ing, and still in great wrath. 
 
 ' I mean Blanche Amory, Arthur Pendennis," 
 Laura said, proudly. " It is but two months since you 
 were sighing at her feet making poems to her plac- 
 ing them in hollow trees by the riverside. I knew all. 
 I watched you that is, she showed them to me. 
 Neither one nor the other was in earnest perhaps; but 
 it is too soon now, Arthur, to begin a new attachment. 
 Go through the time of your your widowhood at least, 
 and do not think of marrying until you are out of 
 mourning."- ( Here the girl's eyes filled with tears, 
 and she passed her hand across them.) " I am angry 
 and hurt, and I have no right to be so, and I ask your 
 pardon in my turn now, dear Arthur. You had a right 
 to love Blanche. She was a thousand times prettier and 
 more accomplished than than any girl near us here; 
 and you could not know that she had no heart; and so 
 you were right to leave her too. I ought not to rebuke 
 you about Blanche Amory, and because she deceived 
 you. Pardon me, Pen," and she held the kind hand 
 out to Pen once more. 
 
 ' We were both jealous," said Pen. " Dear Laura, 
 let us both forgive " and he seized her hand and would 
 have drawn her towards him. He thought that she 
 was relenting, and already assumed the airs of a victor. 
 
 But she shrank back, and her tears passed away ; and 
 she fixed on him a look so melancholy and severe, that 
 the young man in his turn shrunk before it. " Do not
 
 PENDENNIS 439 
 
 mistake me, Arthur," she said, " it cannot be. You do 
 not know what you ask, and do not be too angry with 
 me for saying that I think you do not deserve it. What 
 do you offer in exchange to a woman for her love, hon- 
 our, and obedience? If ever I say these words, dear 
 Pen, I hope to say them in earnest, and by the blessing 
 of God to keep my vow. But you what tie binds you? 
 You do not care about many things which we poor wo- 
 men hold sacred. I do not like to think or ask how far 
 your incredulity leads you. You offer to marry to 
 please our mother, and own that you have no heart to 
 give away. Oh, Arthur, what is it you offer me ? What 
 a rash compact would you enter into so lightly? A 
 month ago, and you would have given yourself to an- 
 other. I pray you do not trifle with your own or others' 
 hearts so recklessly. Go and work; go and mend, dear 
 Arthur, for I see your faults, and dare speak of them 
 now: go and get fame, as you say that you can, and I 
 will pray for my brother, and watch our dearest mother 
 at home." 
 
 " Is that your final decision, Laura? " Arthur cried. 
 ' Yes," said Laura, bowing her head ; and once more 
 giving him her hand, she went away. He saw her pass 
 under the creepers of the little porch, and disappear 
 into the house. The curtains of his mother's window 
 fell at the same minute, but he did not mark that, or 
 suspect that Helen had been witnessing the scene. 
 
 Was he pleased, or was he angry at its termination? 
 He had asked her, and a secret triumph filled his heart 
 to think that he was still free. She had refused him, 
 but did she not love him? That avowal of jealousy 
 made him still think that her heart was his own, what- 
 ever her lips might utter.
 
 440 PENDENNIS 
 
 And now we ought, perhaps, to describe another 
 scene which took place at Fairoaks, between the widow 
 and Laura, when the latter had to tell Helen that she 
 had refused Arthur Pendennis. Perhaps it was the 
 hardest task of all which Laura had to go through in 
 this matter: and the one which gave her the most pain. 
 But as we do not like to see a good woman unjust, we 
 shall not say a word more of the quarrel which now be- 
 fel between Helen and her adopted daughter, or of the 
 bitter tears which the poor girl was made to shed. It 
 was the only difference which she and the widow had 
 ever had as yet, and the more cruel from this cause. 
 Pen left home whilst it was as yet pending and Helen, 
 who could pardon almost everything, could not pardon 
 an act of justice in Laura.
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 BABYLON 
 
 UR reader must now please 
 to quit the woods and sea- 
 shore of the west, and 
 the gossip of Clavering, 
 and the humdrum life 
 of poor little Fairoaks, 
 and transport himself 
 with Arthur Pendennis, 
 on the "Alacrity" coach, 
 to London, whither he 
 goes once for all to face 
 the world and to make 
 his fortune. As the 
 coach whirls through the 
 night away from the 
 friendly gates of home, many a plan does the young man 
 cast in his mind of future life and conduct, prudence, 
 and peradventure success and fame. He knows he is a 
 better man than many who have hitherto been ahead of 
 him in the race : his first failure has caused him remorse, 
 and brought with it reflection ; it has not taken away his 
 courage, or, let us add, his good opinion of himself. A 
 hundred eager fancies and busy hopes keep him awake. 
 How much older his mishaps and a year's thought and 
 self-communion have made him, than when, twelve 
 months since, he passed on this road on his way to and 
 
 441
 
 442 PEXDENXIS 
 
 from Oxbridge! His thoughts turn in the night with 
 inexpressible fondness and tenderness towards the fond 
 mother, who blessed him when parting, and who, in spite 
 of all his past faults and follies, trusts him and loves 
 him still. Blessings be on her! lie prays, as he looks up 
 to the stars overhead. O Heaven, give him strength to 
 work, to endure, to be honest, to avoid temptation, to be 
 worthy of the loving soul who loves him so entirely! 
 Very likely she is awake too, at that moment, and send- 
 ing up to the same Father purer prayers than his for 
 the welfare of her boy. That woman's love is a talis- 
 man by which he holds and hopes to get his safety. 
 And Laura's he would have fain carried her affection 
 with him too, but she has denied it, as he is not worthy 
 of it. He owns as much with shame and remorse; con- 
 fesses how much better and loftier her nature is than 
 his own confesses it, and yet is glad to be free. " I 
 am not good enough for such a creature," he owns to 
 himself. He draws back before her spotless beauty and 
 innocence, as from something that scares him. He feels 
 he is not fit for such a mate as that; as many a wild 
 prodigal who has been pious and guiltless in early days, 
 keeps away from a church which he used to frequent 
 once shunning it, but not hostile to it only feeling 
 that he has no right in that pure place. 
 
 With these thoughts to occupy him, Pen did not fall 
 asleep until the nipping dawn of an October morn- 
 ing, and woke considerably refreshed when the coach 
 
 stopped at the old breakfasting place at B , where 
 
 he had had a score of merry meals on his way to and 
 from school and college many times since he was a boy. 
 As they left that place, the sun broke out brightly, the 
 pace was rapid, the horn blew, the milestones flew by,
 
 PENDENNIS 443 
 
 Pen smoked and joked with guard and fellow-passen- 
 gers and people along the familiar road; it grew more 
 busy and animated at every instant; the last team of 
 greys came out at H , and the coach drove into Lon- 
 don. What young fellow has not felt a thrill as he en- 
 tered the vast place? Hundreds of other carriages, 
 crowded with their thousands of men, were hastening 
 to the great city. " Here is my place," thought Pen; 
 " here is my battle beginning, in which I must fight and 
 conquer, or fall. I have been a boy and a dawdler as 
 yet. Oh, I long, I long to show that I can be a man." 
 And from his place on the coach-roof the eager young 
 fellow looked down upon the city, with the sort of long- 
 ing desire which young soldiers feel on the eve of a 
 campaign. 
 
 As they came along the road, Pen had formed ac- 
 quaintance with a cheery fellow-passenger in a shabby 
 cloak, who talked a great deal about men of letters with 
 whom he was very familiar, and who was, in fact, the 
 reporter of a London newspaper, as whose representa- 
 tive he had been to attend a great wrestling-match in 
 the west. This gentleman knew intimately, as it ap- 
 peared, all the leading men of letters of his day, and 
 talked about Tom Campbell, and Tom Hood, and Syd- 
 ney Smith, and this and the other, as if he had been their 
 most intimate friend. As they passed by Brompton, 
 this gentleman pointed out to Pen Mr. Hurtle, the re- 
 viewer, walking with his umbrella. Pen craned over 
 the coach to have a long look at the great Hurtle. He 
 was a Boniface man, said Pen. And Mr. Doolan, of 
 the "Tom and Jerry" newspaper (for such was the 
 gentleman's name and address upon the card which he 
 handed to Pen), said " Faith he was, and he knew him
 
 444 PENDENNIS 
 
 very well." Pen thought it was quite an honour to 
 have seen the great Mr. Hurtle, whose works he ad- 
 mired. He believed fondly, as yet, in authors, review- 
 ers, and editors of newspapers. Even Wagg, whose 
 books did not appear to him to be masterpieces of hu- 
 man intellect, he yet secretly revered as a successful 
 writer. He mentioned that he had met Wagg in the 
 country, and Doolan told him how that famous novelist 
 received three hundther pounds a volume for every one 
 of his novels. Pen began to calculate instantly whether 
 he might not make five thousand a year. 
 
 The very first acquaintance of his own whom Arthur 
 met, as the coach pulled up at the Gloster Coffee 
 House, was his old friend Harry Foker, who came 
 prancing down Arlington Street behind an enormous 
 cab-horse. He had white kid gloves and white reins, 
 and nature had by this time decorated him with a con- 
 siderable tuft on the chin. A very small cab-boy, vice 
 Stoopid retired, swung on behind Foker's vehicle; 
 knock-kneed and in the tightest leather breeches. 
 Foker looked at the dusty coach, and the smoking 
 horses of the " Alacrity " by which he had made jour- 
 neys in former times. ' What, Foker! " cried out Pen- 
 dennis " Hullo ! Pen, my boy!" said the other, and 
 he waved his whip by way of amity and salute to Ar- 
 thur, who was very glad to see his queer friend's kind 
 old face. Mr. Doolan had a great respect for Pen who 
 had an acquaintance in such a grand cab; and Pen was 
 greatly excited and pleased to be at liberty and in Lon- 
 don. He asked Doolan to come and dine with him at 
 the Covent Garden Coffee House, where he put up: he 
 called a cab and rattled away thither in the highest 
 spirits. He was glad to see the bustling waiter and
 
 PENDENNIS 445 
 
 polite bowing landlord again; and asked for the land- 
 lady, and missed the old Boots, and would have liked 
 to shake hands with everybody. He had a hundred 
 pounds in his pocket. He dressed himself in his very 
 best; dined in the coffee-room with a modest pint of 
 sherry (for he was determined to be very economical), 
 and went to the theatre adjoining. 
 
 The lights and the music, the crowd and the gaiety, 
 charmed and exhilarated Pen, as those sights will do 
 young fellows from college and the country, to whom 
 they are tolerably new. He laughed at the jokes; he 
 applauded the songs, to the delight of some of the 
 dreary old habitues of the boxes, w r ho had ceased long 
 ago to find the least excitement in their place of nightly 
 resort, and were pleased to see any one so fresh, and so 
 much amused. At the end of the first piece, he went 
 and strutted about the lobbies of the theatre, as if he 
 was in a resort of the highest fashion. What tired fre- 
 quenter of the London pave is there that cannot remem- 
 ber having had similar early delusions, and would not 
 call them back again? Here was young Foker again, 
 like an ardent votary of pleasure as he was. He was 
 walking with Granby Tiptoff, of the Household Bri- 
 gade, Lord Tiptoff's brother, and Lord Colchicum, 
 Captain Tiptoff's uncle, a venerable peer, who had been 
 a man of pleasure since the first French Revolution. 
 Foker rushed upon Pen with eagerness, and insisted 
 that the latter should come into his private box, where 
 a lady with the longest ringlets, and the fairest shoul- 
 ders, was seated. This was Miss Blenkinsop, the emi- 
 nent actress of high comedy ; and in the back of the box 
 snoozing in a wig, sate old Blenkinsop, her papa. He 
 was described in the theatrical prints as the " veteran
 
 446 PENDENNIS 
 
 Blenkinsop " " the useful Blenkinsop " " that old 
 favourite of the public, Blenkinsop:" those parts in 
 the drama, which are called the heavy fathers, were 
 usually assigned to this veteran, who, indeed, acted the 
 heavy father in public, as in private life. 
 
 At this time, it being about eleven o'clock, Mrs. Pen- 
 dennis was gone to bed at Fairoaks, and wondering 
 whether her dearest Arthur was at rest after his jour- 
 ney. At this time Laura, too, was awake. And at this 
 time yesterday night, as the coach rolled over silent 
 commons, where cottage windows twinkled, and by 
 darkling woods under calm starlit skies, Pen was vow- 
 ing to reform and to resist temptation, and his heart 
 
 was at home Meanwhile the farce was going on 
 
 very successfully, and Mrs. Leary, in a hussar jacket 
 and braided pantaloons, was enchanting the audience 
 with her archness, her lovely figure, and her delightful 
 ballads. 
 
 Pen, being new to the town, would have liked to lis- 
 ten to Mrs. Leary; but the other people in the box did 
 not care about her song or her pantaloons, and kept up 
 an incessant chattering. Tiptoff knew where her mail- 
 lots came from. Colchicum saw her when she came 
 out in '14. Miss Blenkinsop said she sang out of all 
 tune, to the pain and astonishment of Pen, who thought 
 that she was as beautiful as an angel, and that she sang 
 like a nightingale; and when Hoppus came on as Sir 
 Harcourt Featherby, the young man of the piece, the 
 gentlemen in the box declared that Hoppus was get- 
 ting too stale, and Tiptoff was for Hinging Miss Blen- 
 kinsop's bouquet to him. 
 
 " Not for the world," cried the daughter of the vet- 
 eran Blenkinsop; " Lord Colchicum gave it to me."
 
 PENDENNIS 447 
 
 Pen remembered that nobleman's name, and with a 
 bow and a blush said he believed he had to thank 
 Lord Colchicum for having proposed him at the Poly- 
 anthus Club, at the request of his uncle Major Pen- 
 dennis. 
 
 '* What, you're Wigsby's nephew, are you? " said the 
 peer. " I beg your pardon, we always call him Wigs- 
 by." Pen blushed to hear his venerable uncle called by 
 such a familiar name. ' We balloted you in last week, 
 didn't we? Yes, last Wednesday night. Your uncle 
 wasn't there." 
 
 Here was delightful news for Pen! He professed 
 himself very much obliged indeed to Lord Colchicum, 
 and made him a handsome speech of thanks, to which 
 the other listened, with his double opera-glass up to 
 his eyes. Pen was full of excitement at the idea of 
 being a member of this polite Club. 
 
 " Don't be always looking at that box, you naughty 
 creature," cried Miss Blenkinsop. 
 
 " She's a dev'lish fine woman, that Mirabel," said 
 Tiptoff; "though Mirabel was a d d fool to marry 
 her." 
 
 " A stupid old spooney," said the peer. 
 
 "Mirabel!" cried out Pendennis. 
 
 "Ha! ha!" laughed out Harry Foker. "We've 
 heard of her before, haven't we, Pen? " 
 
 It was Pen's first love. It was Miss Fotheringay. 
 The year before she had been led to the altar by Sir 
 Charles Mirabel, G.C.B., and formerly envoy to the 
 Court of Pumpernickel, who had taken so active a part 
 in the negotiations before the Congress of Swammer- 
 dan, and signed, on behalf of H.B.M., the Peace of 
 Pultusk.
 
 448 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Emily was always as stupid as an owl," said Miss 
 Blenkinsop. 
 
 " Eh! Eh! pas si bete," the old Peer said. 
 
 " Oh, for shame ! " cried the actress, who did not in 
 the least know what he meant. 
 
 And Pen looked out and beheld his first love once 
 again and wondered how he ever could have loved 
 her. 
 
 Thus, on the very first night of his arrival in Lon- 
 don, Mr. Arthur Pendennis found himself introduced 
 to a Club, to an actress of genteel comedy and a heavy 
 father of the Stage, and to a dashing society of jovial 
 blades, old and young ; for my Lord Colchicum, though 
 stricken in years, bald of head, and enfeebled in person, 
 was still indefatigable in the pursuit of enjoyment, and 
 it was the venerable Viscount's boast that he could drink 
 as much claret as the youngest member of the society 
 which he frequented. He lived with the youth about 
 town: he gave them countless dinners at Richmond and 
 Greenwich: an enlightened patron of the drama in all 
 languages and of the Terpsichorean art, he received 
 dramatic professors of all nations at his banquets 
 English from Covent Garden and Strand houses, Ital- 
 ians from the Haymarket, French from their own 
 pretty little theatre, or the boards of the Opera where 
 they danced. And at his villa on the Thames, this pillar 
 of the State gave sumptuous entertainments to scores 
 of young men of fashion, who very affably consorted 
 with the ladies and gentlemen of the green-room with 
 the former chiefly, for Viscount Colchicum preferred 
 their society as more polished and gay than that of their 
 male brethren.
 
 PENDENNIS 449 
 
 Pen went the next day and paid his entrance money 
 at the Club, which operation carried off exactly one- 
 third of his hundred pounds : and took possession of the 
 edifice, and ate his luncheon there with immense satis- 
 faction. He plunged into an easy chair in the library, 
 and tried to read all the magazines. He wondered whe- 
 ther the members were looking at him, and that they 
 could dare to keep on their hats in such fine rooms. He 
 sate down and wrote a letter to Fairoaks on the Club 
 paper, and said, what a comfort this place would be 
 to him after his day's work was over. He went over 
 to his uncle's lodgings in Bury Street with some con- 
 siderable tremor, and in compliance with his mother's 
 earnest desire, that he should instantly call on Major 
 Pendennis; and was not a little relieved to find that 
 the Major had not yet returned to town. His apart- 
 ments were blank. Brown Hollands covered his li- 
 brary-table, and bills and letters lay on the mantel- 
 piece, grimly awaiting the return of their owner. The 
 Major was on the Continent, the landlady of the house 
 said, at Badn-Badn, with the Marcus of Steyne. Pen 
 left his card upon the shelf with the rest. Fairoaks was 
 written on it still. When the Major returned to Lon- 
 don, which he did in time for the fogs of November, 
 after enjoying which he proposed to spend Christmas 
 with some friends in the country, he found another card 
 of Arthur's, on which Lamb Court, Temple, was en- 
 graved, and a note from that } r oung gentleman and 
 from his mother, stating that he was come to town, was 
 entered a member of the Upper Temple, and was read- 
 ing hard for the bar. 
 
 Lamb Court, Temple: where was it? Major Pen- 
 dennis remembered that some ladies of fashion used to
 
 450 PENDENNIS 
 
 talk of dining with Mr. Ayliffe, the barrister, who was 
 in " society," and who lived there in the King's Bench, 
 of which prison there was probably a branch in the 
 Temple, and Ayliffe was very likely an officer. Mr. 
 Deuceace, Lord Crabs's son, had also lived there, he 
 recollected. He dispatched Morgan to find out where 
 Lamb Court was, and to report upon the lodging se- 
 lected by Mr. Arthur. That alert messenger had little 
 difficulty in discovering Mr. Pen's abode. Discreet 
 Morgan had in his time traced people far more difficult 
 to find than Arthur. 
 
 " What sort of a place is it, Morgan? " asked the Ma- 
 jor out of the bed-curtains in Bury Street the next 
 morning, as the valet was arranging his toilet in the 
 deep yellow London fog. 
 
 " I should say rayther a shy place," said Mr. Mor- 
 gan. ' The lawyers lives there, and has their names on 
 the doors. Mr. Harthur lives three pair high, sir. Mr. 
 Warrington lives there too, sir." 
 
 " Suffolk Warringtons! I shouldn't wonder: a good 
 family," thought the Major. ' The cadets of many of 
 our good families follow the robe as a profession. 
 Comfortable rooms, eh? " 
 
 " Honly saw the outside of the door, sir, with Mr. 
 Warrington's name and Mr. Harthur's painted up, and 
 a piece of paper with ' Back at 6 ; ' but I couldn't see 
 no servant, sir." 
 
 ' Economical at any rate," said the Major. 
 ' Very, sir. Three pair, sir. Nasty black staircase 
 as ever I see. Wonder how a gentleman can live in 
 such a place." 
 
 " Pray, who taught you where gentlemen should or 
 should not live, Morgan? Mr. Arthur, sir, is going to
 
 PENDENNIS 451 
 
 study for the bar, sir; " the Major said with much dig- 
 nity; and closed the conversation and began to array 
 himself in the yellow fog. 
 
 " Boys will be boys," the mollified uncle thought to 
 himself. " He has written to me a devilish good letter. 
 Colchicum says he has had him to dine, and thinks him 
 a gentlemanlike lad. His mother is one of the best 
 creatures in the world. If he has sown his wild oats, 
 and will stick to his business, he may do well yet. Think 
 of Charley Mirabel, the old fool, marrying that flame 
 of his; that Fotheringay! He doesn't like to come here 
 till I give him leave, and puts it in a very manly nice 
 way. I was deuced angry with him, after his Ox- 
 bridge escapades and showed it, too, when he was 
 here before Gad, I'll go and see him, hang me, if I 
 don't." 
 
 And having ascertained from Morgan that he could 
 reach the Temple without much difficulty, and that a 
 city omnibus would put him down at the gate, the Ma- 
 jor one day after breakfast at his Club not the Poly- 
 anthus, whereof Mr. Pen was just elected a member, 
 but another Club: for the Major was too wise to have a 
 nephew as a constant inmate of any house where he was 
 in the habit of passing his time the Major one day 
 entered one of those public vehicles, and bade the con- 
 ductor to put him down at the gate of the Upper Tem- 
 ple. 
 
 When Major Pendennis reached that dingy portal 
 it was about twelve o'clock in the day; and he was 
 directed by a civil personage with a badge and a white 
 apron, through some dark alleys, and under various 
 melancholy archways into courts each more dismal than 
 the other, until finally he reached Lamb Court. If
 
 452 PENDENNIS 
 
 it was dark in Pall Mall, what was it in Lamb Court? 
 Candles were burning in many of the rooms there in 
 the pupil-room of Mr. Hodgman, the special pleader, 
 whose six pupils were scribbling declarations under the 
 tallow; in Sir Hokey Walker's clerk's room, where the 
 clerk, a person far more gentlemanlike and cheerful in 
 appearance than the celebrated counsel, his master, was 
 conversing in a patronising manner with the managing 
 clerk of an attorney at the door ; and in the Curling the 
 wig-maker's melancholy shop, where, from behind the 
 feeble glimmer of a couple of lights, large Serjeants' 
 and judges' wigs were looming drearily, with the blank 
 blocks looking at the lamp-post in the court. Two 
 little clerks were playing at toss-halfpenny under that 
 lamp. A laundress in pattens passed in at one door, a 
 newspaper boy issued from another. A porter, whose 
 white apron was faintly visible, paced up and down. It 
 would be impossible to conceive a place more dismal, 
 and the Major shuddered to think that any one should 
 select such a residence. "Good Ged!" he said, "the 
 poor boy mustn't live on here." 
 
 The feeble and filthy oil-lamps, with which the stair- 
 cases of the Upper Temple are lighted of nights, were 
 of course not illuminating the stairs by day, and Major 
 Pendennis, having read with difficulty his nephew's 
 name under Mr. Warrington's on the wall of No. 6, 
 found still greater difficulty in climbing the abominable 
 black stairs, up the banisters of which, which contrib- 
 uted their damp exudations to his gloves, he groped 
 painfully until he came to the third story. A candle 
 was in the passage of one of the two sets of rooms ; the 
 doors were open, and the names of Mr. Warrington 
 and Mr. A. Pendennis were very clearly visible to the
 
 Fen pursuing his law studies
 
 PENDENNIS 453 
 
 Major as he went in. An Irish charwoman, with a 
 pail and broom, opened the door for the Major. 
 
 "Is that the beer? " cried out a great voice: " give us 
 hold of it." 
 
 The gentleman who was speaking was seated on a 
 table, unshorn and smoking a short pipe; in a farther 
 chair sate Pen, with a cigar, and his legs near the fire. 
 A little boy, who acted as the clerk of these gentle- 
 men, was grinning in the Major's face, at the idea of 
 his being mistaken for beer. Here, upon the third floor, 
 the rooms were somewhat lighter, and the Major could 
 see the place. 
 
 " Pen, my boy, it's I it's your uncle," he said, 
 choking with the smoke. But as most young men of 
 fashion used the weed, he pardoned the practice easily 
 enough. 
 
 Mr. Warrington got up from the table, and Pen, in a 
 very perturbed manner, from his chair. "Beg your 
 pardon for mistaking you," said Warrington, in a 
 frank, loud voice. ' Will you take a cigar, sir? Clear 
 those things off the chair, Pidgeon, and pull it round 
 to the fire." 
 
 Pen flung his cigar into the grate; and was pleased 
 with the cordiality with which his uncle shook him by 
 the hand. As soon as he could speak for the stairs and 
 the smoke, the Major began to ask Pen very kindty 
 about himself and about his mother; for blood is blood, 
 and he was pleased once more to see the boy. 
 
 Pen gave his news, and then introduced Mr. War- 
 rington an old Boniface man whose chambers he 
 shared. 
 
 The Major was quite satisfied when he heard that 
 Mr. Warrington was a younger son of Sir Miles Warr
 
 454 PENDENNIS 
 
 rington of Suffolk. He had served with an uncle of his 
 in India and in New South Wales, years ago. 
 
 ' Took a sheep-farm there, sir, made a fortune bet- 
 ter thing than law or soldiering," Warrington said. 
 
 ' Think I shall go there, too." And here, the expected 
 beer coming in, in a tankard with a glass bottom, Mr. 
 Warrington, with a laugh, said he supposed the Major 
 would not have any, and took a long, deep draught him- 
 self, after which he wiped his wrist across his beard with 
 great satisfaction. The young man was perfectly easy 
 and unembarrassed. He was dressed in a ragged old 
 shooting- jacket, and had a bristly blue beard. He was 
 drinking beer like a coal-heaver, and yet you couldn't 
 but perceive that he was a gentleman. 
 
 When he had sate for a minute or two after his 
 draught he went out of the room, leaving it to Pen and 
 his uncle, that they might talk over family affairs were 
 they so inclined. 
 
 " Rough and ready, your chum seems," the Major 
 said. " Somewhat different from your dandy friends 
 at Oxbridge." 
 
 ' Times are altered," Arthur replied, with a blush. 
 
 ' Warrington is only just called, and has no business, 
 but he knows law pretty well ; and until I can afford to 
 read with a pleader, I use his books and get his help." 
 " Is that one of the books? " the Major asked, with 
 a smile. A French novel was lying at the foot of Pen's 
 chair. 
 
 ' This is not a working day, sir," the lad said. ' We 
 were out very late at a party last night at Lady Whis- 
 ton's," Pen added, knowing his uncle's weakness. 
 " Everybody in town was there except you, sir ; Counts, 
 Ambassadors, Turks, Stars and Garters I don't know
 
 PENDENNIS 455 
 
 who it's all in the paper and my name, too," said 
 Pen, with great glee. " I met an old flame of mine 
 there, sir," he added, with a laugh. ' You know whom 
 I mean, sir, Lady Mirabel to whom I was intro- 
 duced over again. She shook hands, and was gracious 
 enough. I may thank you for being out of that scrape, 
 sir. She presented me to the husband, too an old beau 
 in a star and a blond wig. He does not seem very wise. 
 She has asked me to call on her, sir: and I may go now 
 without any fear of losing my heart." 
 
 " What, we have had some new loves, have we? " the 
 Major asked, in high good-humour. 
 
 " Some two or three," Mr. Pen said, laughing. " But 
 I don't put on my grand serieux any more, sir. That 
 goes off after the first flame." 
 
 " Very right, my dear boy. Flames and darts and 
 passion, and that sort of thing, do very well for a lad: 
 and you were but. a lad when that affair with the Foth- 
 eringill Fotheringay (what's her name?) came off. 
 But a man of the world gives up those follies. You 
 still may do very well. You have been hit, but you may 
 recover. You are heir to a little independence, which 
 everybody fancies is a doosid deal more. You have a 
 good name, good wits, good manners, and a good per- 
 son and, begad! I don't see why you shouldn't marry 
 a woman with money get into Parliament distin- 
 guish yourself, and and, in fact, that sort of thing. 
 Remember, it's as easy to marry a rich woman as a poor 
 woman: and a devilish deal pleasanter to sit down to 
 a good dinner than to a scrag of mutton in lodgings. 
 Make up your mind to that. A woman with a good 
 jointure is a doosid deal easier a profession than the 
 law, let me tell you. Look out ; Z shall be on the watch
 
 456 PENDENNIS 
 
 for you: and I shall die content, my boy, if I can see 
 you with a good lady-like wife, and a good carriage, 
 and a good pair of horses, living in society, and seeing 
 your friends, like a gentleman." It was thus this affec- 
 tionate uncle spoke, and expounded to Pen his simple 
 philosophy. 
 
 ' What would my mother and Laura say to this, I 
 wonder? " thought the lad. Indeed, old Pendennis's 
 morals were not their morals, nor was his wisdom theirs. 
 
 This affecting conversation between uncle and 
 nephew had scarcely concluded, when Warrington 
 came out of his bed-room, no longer in rags, but dressed 
 like a gentleman, straight and tall, and perfectly frank 
 and good-humoured. He did the honours of his ragged 
 sitting-room with as much ease as if it had been the 
 finest apartment in London. And queer rooms they 
 were in which the Major found his nephew. The car- 
 pet was full of holes the table stained with many cir- 
 cles of Warrington's previous ale-pots. There was a 
 small library of law-books, books of poetry, and of 
 mathematics, of which he was very fond. (He had 
 been one of the hardest livers and hardest readers of 
 his time at Oxbridge, where the name of Stunning 
 Warrington was yet famous for beating bargemen, 
 pulling matches, winning prizes, and drinking milk- 
 punch.) A print of the old college hung up over the 
 mantel-piece, and some battered volumes of Plato, bear- 
 ing its well-known arms, were on the book-shelves. 
 There were two easy chairs; a standing reading-desk 
 piled with bills; a couple of very meagre briefs on a 
 broken-legged study-table. Indeed, there was scarcely 
 any article of furniture that had not been in the wars, 
 and was not wounded. " Look here, sir, here is Pen's
 
 Arthur meets with an 
 old acquaintance
 
 PENDENNIS 457 
 
 room. He is a dandy, and has got curtains to his bed, 
 and wears shiny boots, and has a silver dressing-case." 
 Indeed, Pen's room was rather coquettishly arranged, 
 and a couple of neat prints of opera-dancers, besides a 
 drawing of Fairoaks, hung on the walls. In Warring- 
 ton's room there was scarcely any article of furniture, 
 save a great shower-bath, and a heap of books by the 
 bed-side; where he lay upon straw like Margery Daw, 
 and smoked his pipe, and read half through the night his 
 favourite poetry or mathematics. 
 
 When he had completed his simple toilette, Mr. 
 Warrington came out of this room, and proceeded to 
 the cupboard to search for his breakfast. 
 
 " Might I offer you a mutton-chop, sir? We cook 
 'em ourselves, hot and hot; and I am teaching Pen the 
 first principles of law, cooking, and morality at the 
 same time. He's a lazy beggar, sir, and too much of 
 a dandy." 
 
 And so saying, Mr. Warrington wiped a gridiron 
 with a piece of paper, put it on the fire, and on it two 
 mutton chops, and took from the cupboard a couple of 
 plates, and some knives and silver forks, and casters. 
 
 " Say but a word, Major Pendennis," he said; 
 " there's another chop in the cupboard, or Pidgeon 
 shall go out and get you anything you like." 
 
 Major Pendennis sate in wonder and amusement, 
 but he said he had just breakfasted, and wouldn't have 
 any lunch. So Warrington cooked the chops, and 
 popped them hissing hot upon the plates. 
 
 Pen fell to at his chop with a good appetite, after 
 looking up at his uncle, and seeing that gentleman was 
 still in good-humour. 
 
 "You see, sir," Warrington said, "Mrs. Flanagan
 
 458 PENDENNIS 
 
 isn't here to do 'em, and we can't employ the boy, for 
 the little beggar is all day occupied cleaning Pen's 
 boots. And now for another swig at the beer. Pen 
 drinks tea; it's only fit for old women." 
 
 " And so you were at Lady Whiston's last night," 
 the Major said, not in truth knowing what observation 
 to make to this rough diamond. 
 
 " I at Lady Whiston's! not such a flat, sir. I don't 
 care for female society. In fact, it bores me. I spent 
 my evening philosophically at the Back Kitchen." 
 
 "The Back Kitchen? indeed!" said the Major. 
 
 "I see you don't know what it means," Warrington 
 said. " Ask Pen. He was there after Lady Whis- 
 ton's. Tell Major Pendennis about the Back Kitchen, 
 Pen don't be ashamed of yourself." 
 
 So Pen said it was a little eccentric society of men 
 of letters and men about town, to which he had been 
 presented; and the Major began to think that the 
 young fellow had seen a good deal of the world since 
 his arrival in London.
 
 CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 THE KNIGHTS OF THE TEMPLE 
 
 OLLEGES, schools, and 
 inns of court, still have 
 some respect for antiquity, 
 and maintain a great num- 
 ber of the customs and 
 institutions of our an- 
 cestors, with 
 which those 
 persons who 
 do not partic- 
 ularly regard 
 their forefa- 
 thers, or per- 
 haps are not 
 very well ac- 
 quainted with 
 
 them, have long since done away. A well-ordained 
 workhouse or prison is much better provided with the 
 appliances of health, comfort, and cleanliness, than a 
 respectable Foundation School, a venerable College, or 
 a learned Inn. In the latter place of residence men are 
 contented to sleep in dingj^ closets, and to pay for the 
 sitting-room and the cupboard, which is their dormitory, 
 the price of a good villa and garden in the suburbs, or 
 of a roomy house in the neglected squares of the town. 
 The poorest mechanic in Spitalfields has a cistern and 
 
 459
 
 460 PENDENNIS 
 
 an unbounded supply of water at his command ; but the 
 gentlemen of the inns of court, and the gentlemen of 
 the universities, have their supply of this cosmetic 
 fetched in jugs by laundresses and bedmakers, and live 
 in abodes which were erected long before the custom 
 of cleanliness and decency obtained among us. There 
 are individuals still alive who sneer at the people, and 
 speak of them with epithets of scorn. Gentlemen, there 
 can be but little doubt that your ancestors were the 
 Great Unwashed: and in the Temple especially, it is 
 pretty certain, that only under the greatest difficulties 
 and restrictions, the virtue which has been pronounced 
 to be next to godliness could have been practised at all. 
 Old Grump, of the Norfolk Circuit, who had lived 
 for more than thirty years in the chambers under those 
 occupied by Warrington and Pendennis, and who used 
 to be awakened by the roaring of the shower-baths 
 which those gentlemen had erected in their apartments, 
 part of the contents of which occasionally trickled 
 through the roof into Mr. Grump's room, declared 
 that the practice was an absurd, newfangled, dandy- 
 fied folly, and daily cursed the laundress who slopped 
 the staircase by which he had to pass. Grump, now 
 much more than half a century old, had indeed never 
 used the luxury in question. He had done without 
 water very well, and so had our fathers before him. 
 Of all those knights and baronets, lords and gentle- 
 men, bearing arms, whose escutcheons are painted 
 upon the walls of the famous hall of the Upper Tem- 
 ple, was there no philanthropist good-natured enough 
 to devise a set of Hummums for the benefit of the 
 lawyers, his fellows and successors? The Temple his- 
 torian makes no mention of such a scheme. There is
 
 PENDENNIS 461 
 
 Pump Court and Fountain Court, with their hydraulic 
 apparatus, but one never heard of a bencher disport- 
 ing in the fountain; and can't but think how many a 
 counsel learned in the law of old days might have bene- 
 fitted by the pump. 
 
 Nevertheless, those venerable Inns, which have the 
 Lamb and Flag and the Winged Horse for their en- 
 signs, have attractions for persons who inhabit them, 
 and a share of rough comforts and freedom, which 
 men always remember with pleasure. I don't know 
 whether the student of law permits himself the refresh- 
 ment of enthusiasm, or indulges in poetical reminis- 
 cences as he passes by historical chambers, and says, 
 ' Yonder Eldon lived upon this site Coke mused 
 upon Lyttleton here Chitty toiled here Barnwell 
 and Alderson joined in their famous labours here 
 Byles composed his great work upon bills, and Smith 
 compiled his immortal leading cases here Gustavus 
 still toils, with Solomon to aid him : " but the man of 
 letters can't but love the place which has been inhabited 
 by so many of his brethren, or peopled by their crea- 
 tions as real to us at this day as the authors whose chil- 
 dren they were and Sir Roger de Coverley walking in 
 the Temple Garden, and discoursing with Mr. Spec- 
 tator about the beauties in hoops and patches who are 
 sauntering over the grass, is just as lively a figure to 
 me as old Samuel Johnson rolling through the fog 
 with the Scotch gentleman at his heels on their way to 
 Dr. Goldsmith's chambers in Brick Court; or Harry 
 Fielding, with inked ruffles and a wet towel round his 
 head, dashing off articles at midnight for the Covent 
 Garden Journal, while the printer's boy is asleep in the 
 passage.
 
 462 PENDENNIS 
 
 If we could but get the history of a single day as it 
 passed in any one of those four-storied houses in the 
 dingy court where our friends Pen and Warrington 
 dwelt, some Temple Asmodeus might furnish us with 
 a queer volume. There may be a great parliamentary 
 counsel on the ground-floor, who drives off to Bel- 
 gravia at dinner-time, when his clerk, too, becomes a 
 gentleman, and goes away to entertain his friends, and 
 to take his pleasure. But a short time since he was 
 hungry and briefless in some garret of the Inn; lived 
 by stealthy literature; hoped, and waited, and sickened, 
 and no clients came; exhausted his own means and his 
 friends' kindness; had to remonstrate humbly with 
 duns, and to implore the patience of poor creditors. 
 Ruin seemed to be staring him in the face, when, be- 
 hold, a turn of the wheel of fortune, and the lucky 
 wretch in possession of one of those prodigious prizes 
 which are sometimes drawn in the great lottery of the 
 Bar. Many a better lawyer than himself does not 
 make a fifth part of the income of his clerk, who, 
 a few months since, could scarcely get credit for black- 
 ing for his master's unpaid boots. On the first-floor, 
 perhaps, you will have a venerable man whose name 
 is famous, who has lived for half a century in the Inn, 
 whose brains are full of books, and whose shelves are 
 stored with classical and legal lore. He has lived alone 
 all these fifty years, alone and for himself, amassing 
 learning, and compiling a fortune. He comes home 
 now at night only from the club, where he has been 
 dining freely, to the lonely chambers where he lives 
 a godless old recluse. When he dies, his Inn will erect 
 a tablet to his honour, and his heirs burn a part of his 
 library. Would you like to have such a prospect for
 
 PENDENNIS 4G3 
 
 your old age, to store up learning and money, and end 
 so? But we must not linger too long by Mr. Dooms- 
 day's door. Worthy Mr. Grump lives over him, who 
 is also an ancient inhabitant of the Inn, and who, when 
 Doomsday comes home to read Catullus, is sitting 
 down with three steady seniors of his standing, to a 
 steady rubber at whist, after a dinner at which they 
 have consumed their three steady bottles of Port. You 
 may see the old boys asleep at the Temple Church of 
 a Sunday. Attorneys seldom trouble them, and they 
 have small fortunes of their own. On the other side 
 of the third landing, where Pen and Warrington live, 
 till long after midnight, sits Mr. Paley, who took the 
 highest honours, and who is a fellow of his college, 
 who will sit and read and note cases until two o'clock 
 in the morning; who will rise at seven and be at the 
 pleader's chambers as soon as they are open, where he 
 will work until an hour before dinner-time; who will 
 come home from Hall and read and note cases again 
 until dawn next day, when perhaps Mr. Arthur Pen- 
 dennis and his friend Mr. Warrington are returning 
 from some of their wild expeditions. How differ- 
 ently employed Mr. Paley has been! He has not been 
 throwing himself away: he has only been bringing a 
 great intellect laboriously down to the comprehension 
 of a mean subject, and in his fierce grasp of that, reso- 
 lutely excluding from his mind all higher thoughts, all 
 better things, all the wisdom of philosophers and his- 
 torians, all the thoughts of poets; all wit, fancy, re- 
 flection, art, love, truth altogether so that he may 
 master that enormous legend of the law, which he pro- 
 poses to gain his livelihood by expounding. Warring- 
 ton and Paley had been competitors for university
 
 464 PENDENNIS 
 
 honours in former days, and had run each other hard; 
 and everybody said now that the former was wasting 
 his time and energies, whilst all people praised Paley 
 for his industry. There may be doubts, however, as 
 to which was using his time best. The one could afford 
 time to think, and the other never could. The one 
 could have sympathies and do kindnesses; and the 
 other must needs be always selfish. He could not cul- 
 tivate a friendship or do a charity, or admire a work 
 of genius, or kindle at the sight of beauty or the sound 
 of a sweet song he had no time, and no eyes for any- 
 thing but his law-books. All was dark outside his 
 reading-lamp. Love, and Nature, and Art, (which is 
 the expression of our praise and sense of the beautiful 
 world of God), were shut out from him. And as he 
 turned off his lonely lamp at night, he never thought 
 but that he had spent the day profitably, and went to 
 sleep alike thankless and remorseless. But he shud- 
 dered when he met his old companion Warrington on 
 the stairs, and shunned him as one that was doomed to 
 perdition. 
 
 It may have been the sight of that cadaverous am- 
 bition and self-complacent meanness, which showed it- 
 self in Paley's yellow face, and twinkled in his narrow 
 eyes, or it may have been a natural appetite for plea- 
 sure and joviality, of which it must be confessed Mr. 
 Pen was exceedingly fond, which deterred that luck- 
 less youth from pursuing his designs upon the Bench 
 or the Woolsack with the ardour, or rather steadiness, 
 which is requisite in gentlemen who would climb to 
 those seats of honour. He enjoyed the Temple life 
 with a great deal of relish: his worthy relatives 
 thought he was reading as became a regular student:
 
 PENDENNIS 465 
 
 and his uncle wrote home congratulatory letters to 
 the kind widow at Fairoaks, announcing that the lad 
 had sown his wild oats, and was becoming quite steady. 
 The truth is, that it was a new sort of excitement to 
 Pen the life in which he was now engaged, and having 
 given up some of the dandyfied pretensions, and fine- 
 gentleman airs which he had contracted among his aris- 
 tocratic college acquaintances, of whom he now saw 
 but little, the rough pleasures and amusements of a 
 London bachelor were very novel and agreeable to 
 him, and he enjoyed them all. Time was he would 
 have envied the dandies their fine horses in Rotten 
 Row, but he was contented now to walk in the Park 
 and look at them. He was too young to succeed in 
 London society without a better name and a larger 
 fortune than he had, and too lazy to get on without 
 these adjuncts. Old Pendennis fondly thought he 
 was busied with law because he neglected the social ad- 
 vantages presented to him, and, having been at half a 
 dozen balls and evening parties, retreated before their 
 dullness and sameness; and whenever anybody made 
 enquiries of the worthy Major about his nephew, the 
 old gentleman said the young rascal was reformed, 
 and could not be got away from his books. But the 
 Major would have been almost as much horrified as 
 Mr. Paley was, had he known what was Mr. Pen's 
 real course of life, and how much pleasure entered into 
 his law studies. 
 
 A long morning's reading, a walk in the park, a pull 
 on the river, a stretch up the hill to Hampstead, and 
 a modest tavern dinner; a bachelor night passed here 
 and there, in joviality, not vice (for Arthur Pendennis 
 admired women so heartily that he could never bear
 
 4G6 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 the society of any of them that were not, in his fancy 
 at least, good and pure) ; a quiet evening at home, 
 alone with a friend and a pipe or two, and a humble 
 
 potation of British spirits, whereof Mrs. Flanagan, 
 the laundress, invariably tested the quality; these 
 were our young gentleman's pursuits, and it must be 
 owned that his life was not unpleasant. In term-time, 
 Mr. Pen showed a most praiseworthy regularity in per- 
 forming one part of the law-student's course of duty,
 
 PENDENNIS 467 
 
 and eating his dinners in Hall. Indeed, that Hall of 
 the Upper Temple is a sight not uninteresting, and 
 with the exception of some trifling improvements and 
 anachronisms which have been introduced into the 
 practice there, a man may sit down and fancy that he 
 joins in a meal of the seventeenth century. The bar 
 have their messes, the students their tables apart; the 
 benchers sit at the high table on the raised platform, 
 surrounded by pictures of judges of the law and por- 
 traits of royal personages who have honoured its fes- 
 tivities with their presence and patronage. Pen looked 
 about, on his first introduction, not a little amused with 
 the scene which he witnessed. Among his comrades of 
 the student class there were gentlemen of all ages, from 
 sixty to seventeen; stout grey-headed attorneys who 
 were proceeding to take the superior dignity, dandies 
 and men-about-town who wished for some reason to be 
 barristers of seven years' standing, swarthy, black- 
 eyed natives of the Colonies, who came to be called here 
 before they practised in their own islands, and many 
 gentlemen of the Irish nation, who make a sojourn in 
 Middle Temple Lane before they return to the green 
 country of their birth. There were little squads of 
 reading students who talked law all dinner-time; there 
 were rowing men, whose discourse was of sculling 
 matches, the Red House, Vauxhall, and the Opera; 
 there were others great in politics, and orators of the 
 students' debating clubs; with all of which sets, except 
 the first, whose talk was an almost unknown and quite 
 uninteresting language to him, Mr. Pen made a gradual 
 acquaintance, and had many points of sympathy. 
 
 The ancient and liberal Inn of the Upper Temple 
 provides in its Hall, and for a most moderate price, an
 
 468 PENDENNIS 
 
 excellent wholesome dinner of soup, meat, tarts, and 
 port wine or sherry, for the barristers and students who 
 attend that place of refection. The parties are arranged 
 in messes of four, each of which quartets has its piece 
 of beef or leg of mutton, its sufficient apple-pie and its 
 bottle of wine. But the honest habitues of the hall, 
 amongst the lower rank of students, who have a taste 
 for good living, have many harmless arts by which they 
 improve their banquet, and innocent " dodges " (if we 
 may be permitted to use an excellent phrase that has be- 
 come vernacular since the appearance of the last dic- 
 tionaries) by which they strive to attain for themselves 
 more delicate food than the common every-day roast 
 meat of the students' tables. 
 
 '* Wait a bit," said Mr. Lowton, one of these Temple 
 gourmands. " Wait a bit," said Mr. Lowton, tugging at 
 Pen's gown " the tables are very full, and there's only 
 three benchers to eat ten side dishes if we wait, per- 
 haps we shall get something from their table." And Pen 
 looked with some amusement, as did Mr. Lowton with 
 eyes of fond desire, towards the benchers' high table, 
 where three old gentlemen were standing up before a 
 dozen silver dish-covers, while the clerk was quavering 
 out a grace. 
 
 Lowton was great in the conduct of the dinner. His 
 aim was to manage so as to be the first, or captain of 
 the mess, and to secure for himself the thirteenth glass 
 of the bottle of port wine. Thus he would have the 
 command of the joint on which he operated his favourite 
 cuts, and made rapid dexterous appropriations of 
 gravy, which amused Pen infinitely. Poor Jack Low- 
 ton 1 thy pleasures in life were very harmless; an eager 
 epicure, thy desires did not go beyond eighteen-pence.
 
 PENDENNIS 469 
 
 Pen was somewhat older than many of his fellow-stu- 
 dents, and there was that about his style and appearance 
 which, as we have said, was rather haughty and imper- 
 tinent, that stamped him as a man of ton very unlike 
 those pale students who were talking law to one another, 
 and those ferocious dandies, in rowing shirts and aston- 
 ishing pins and waistcoats, who represented the idle part 
 of the little community. The humble and good-natured 
 Lowton had felt attracted by Pen's superior looks and 
 presence and had made acquaintance with him at the 
 mess by opening the conversation. 
 
 " This is boiled-beef day, I believe, sir," said Lowton 
 to Pen. 
 
 ' Upon my word, sir, I'm not aware," said Pen, 
 hardly able to contain his laughter, but added, " I'm a 
 stranger; this is my first term; " on which Lowton be- 
 gan to point out to him the notabilities in the Hall. 
 
 ' That's Boosey the bencher, the bald one sitting 
 under the picture and 'aving soup ; I wonder whether it's 
 turtle? They often 'ave turtle. Next is Balls, the 
 King's Counsel, and Swettenham Hodge and Swet- 
 tenham, you know. That's old Grump, the senior of 
 the bar; they say he's dined here forty years. They 
 often send 'em down their fish from the benchers to the 
 senior table. Do you see those four fellows seated op- 
 posite us? They are regular swells tip-top fellows, I 
 can tell you Mr. Trail, the Bishop of Ealing's son, 
 Honourable Fred. Ringwood, Lord Cinqbars' brother, 
 you know. He'll have a good place, I bet any money: 
 and Bob Suckling, who's always with him a high fel- 
 low too. Ha! ha! " Here Lowton burst into a laugh. 
 
 ' What is it? " said Pen, still amused. 
 
 " I say, I like to mess with those chaps," Lowton said,
 
 470 PENDENNIS 
 
 winking his eye knowingly, and pouring out his glass of 
 wine. 
 
 " And why? " asked Pen. 
 
 ' Why ! they don't come down here to dine, you know, 
 they only make believe to dine. They dine here, Law 
 bless you ! They go to some of the swell clubs, or else to 
 some grand dinner party. You see their names in the 
 ' Morning Post ' at all the fine parties in London. Why, 
 I bet anything that Ringwood has his cab, or Trail his 
 brougham (he's a devil of a fellow, and makes the bish- 
 op's money spin, I can tell you) at the corner of Essex 
 Street at this minute. They dine! They won't dine 
 these two hours, I dare say." 
 
 " But why should you like to mess with them, if they 
 don't eat any dinner? " Pen asked, still puzzled. 
 " There's plenty, isn't there? " 
 
 " How green you are," said Lowton. " Excuse me, 
 but you are green. They don't drink any wine, don't 
 you see, and a fellow gets the bottle to himself if he 
 likes it when he messes with those three chaps. That's 
 why Corkoran got in with 'em." 
 
 " Ah, Mr. Lowton, I see you are a sly fellow," Pen 
 said, delighted with his acquaintance : on which the other 
 modestly replied, that he had lived in London the better 
 part of his life, and of course had his eyes about him; 
 and went on with his catalogue to Pen. 
 
 "There's a lot of Irish here," he said: "that Cor- 
 koran's one, and I can't say I like him. You see that 
 handsome chap with the blue neck -cloth, and pink shirt, 
 and yellow waistcoat, that's another: that's Molloy Ma- 
 loney, of Ballymaloney, and nephew to Major-General 
 Sir Hector O'Dowd, he, he," Lowton said, trying to 
 imitate the Hibernian accent. " He's always bragging
 
 PENDENNIS 471 
 
 about his uncle; and came into Hall in silver-striped 
 trowsers the day he had been presented. That other 
 near him, with the long black hair, is a tremendous 
 rebel. By Jove, sir, to hear him at the Forum it makes 
 your blood freeze; and the next is an Irishman, too, 
 Jack Finucane, a reporter of a newspaper. They 
 all stick together, those Irish. It's your turn to fill 
 your glass. What? you won't have any port? Don't 
 like port with your dinner? Here's your health." And 
 this worthy man found himself not the less attached 
 to Pendennis because the latter disliked port wine at 
 dinner. 
 
 It was while Pen was taking his share of one of these 
 dinners with his acquaintance Lowton as the captain of 
 his mess, that there came to join them a gentleman in a 
 barrister's gown, who could not find a seat, as it ap- 
 peared, amongst the persons of his own degree, and who 
 strode over the table and took his place on the bench 
 where Pen sate. He was dressed in old clothes and a 
 faded gown, which hung behind him, and he wore a shirt 
 which, though clean, was extremely ragged, and very 
 different to the magnificent pink raiment of Mr. Mol- 
 loy Maloney, who occupied a commanding position in 
 the next mess. In order to notify their appearance at 
 dinner, it is the custom of the gentlemen who eat in the 
 Upper Temple Hall to write down their names upon 
 slips of paper, which are provided for that purpose, 
 with a pencil for each mess. Lowton wrote his name 
 first, then came Arthur Pendennis, and the next was 
 that of the gentleman in the old clothes. He smiled 
 when he saw Pen's name, and looked at him. ' We 
 ought to know each other," he said. ' We're both Boni- 
 face men; my name's Warrington."
 
 472 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Are you St Warrington? " Pen said, delighted 
 
 to see this hero. 
 
 Warrington laughed " Stunning Warrington - 
 yes," he said. " I recollect you in your freshman's 
 term. But you appear to have quite cut me out." 
 
 ' The college talks about you still," said Pen, who 
 had a generous admiration for talent and pluck. " The 
 bargeman you thrashed, Bill Simes, don't you remem- 
 ber, wants you up again at Oxbridge. The Miss Not- 
 leys, the haberdashers 
 
 "Hush!" said Warrington "glad to make your 
 acquaintance, Pendennis. Heard a good deal about 
 you." 
 
 The young men were friends immediately, and at 
 once deep in college-talk. And Pen, who had been act- 
 ing rather the fine gentleman on a previous day, when 
 he pretended to Lowton that he could not drink port 
 wine at dinner, seeing Warrington take his share with 
 a great deal of gusto, did not scruple about helping 
 himself any more, rather to the disappointment of hon- 
 est Lowton. When the dinner was over, Warrington 
 asked Arthur where he was going. 
 
 " I thought of going home to dress, and hear Grisi 
 in Norma," Pen said. 
 
 " Are you going to meet anybody there? " he asked. 
 
 I^en said, " No only to hear the music, of which he 
 was very fond." 
 
 " You had much better come home and smoke a pipe 
 with me," said Warrington, " a very short one. 
 Come, I live close by in Lamb Court, and we'll talk over 
 Boniface and old times." 
 
 They went away; Lowton sighed after them. He 
 knew that Warrington was a baronet's son, and he
 
 PENDENNIS 473 
 
 looked up with simple reverence to all the aristocracy. 
 Pen and Warrington became sworn friends from that 
 night. Warrington's cheerfulness and jovial temper, 
 his good sense, his rough welcome, and his never-failing 
 pipe of tobacco, charmed Pen, who found it more pleas- 
 ant to dive into shilling taverns with him, than to dine 
 in solitary state amongst the silent and polite frequent- 
 ers of the Polyanthus. 
 
 Ere long Pen gave up his lodgings in St. James's, to 
 which he had migrated on quitting his hotel, and found 
 it was much more economical to take up his abode with 
 Warrington in Lamb Court, and furnish and occupy 
 his friend's vacant room there. For it must be said of 
 Pen, that no man was more easily led than he to do a 
 thing, when it was a novelty, or when he had a mind to 
 it. And Pidgeon, the youth, and Flanagan, the laun- 
 dress, divided their allegiance now between Warrington 
 and Pen.
 
 CHAPTER XXX 
 
 OLD AND NEW ACQUAINTANCES 
 
 LATED with the idea of seeing 
 life, Pen went into a 
 hundred 
 haunts. 
 
 queer London 
 He liked to 
 
 I think he was consorting 
 with all sorts of men so 
 he beheld coalheavers in 
 their taprooms; boxers in 
 their inn-parlours ; honest 
 citizens disporting in the 
 suburbs or on the river; 
 and he would have liked 
 to hob and nob with cel- 
 ebrated pickpockets, or 
 drink a pot of ale with 
 a company of burglars and cracksmen, had chance af- 
 forded him an opportunity of making the acquaintance 
 of this class of society. It was good to see the gravity 
 with which Warrington listened to the Tutbury Pet or 
 the Brighton Stunner at the Champion's Arms, and be- 
 hold the interest which he took in the coalheaving com- 
 pany assembled at the Fox-under-the-Hill. His ac- 
 quaintance with the public-houses of the metropolis and 
 its neighbourhood, and with the frequenters of their va- 
 rious parlours, was prodigious. He was the personal 
 
 474
 
 PENDENNIS 475 
 
 friend of the landlord and landlady, and welcome to the 
 bar as to the club-room. He liked their society, he said, 
 better than that of his own class, whose manners annoyed 
 him, and whose conversation bored him. " In society," he 
 used to say, " everybody is the same, wears the same 
 dress, eats and drinks, and says the same things; one 
 young dandy at the club talks and looks just like an- 
 other, one Miss at a ball exactly resembles another, 
 whereas there's character here. I like to talk with the 
 strongest man in England, or the man who can drink 
 the most beer in England, or with that tremendous re- 
 publican of a hatter, who thinks Thistlewood was the 
 greatest character in history. I like gin-and-water bet- 
 ter than claret. I like a sanded floor in Carnaby Mar- 
 ket better than a chalked one in Mayfair. I prefer 
 snobs, I own it." Indeed, this gentleman was a social 
 republican; and it never entered his head while convers- 
 ing with Jack and Tom that he was in any respect their 
 better ; although, perhaps, the deference which they paid 
 him might secretly please him. 
 
 Pen followed him then to these various resorts of men 
 with great glee and assiduity. But he was considerably 
 younger, and therefore much more pompous and stately 
 than Warrington; in fact, a young prince in disguise, 
 visiting the poor of his father's kingdom. They re- 
 spected him as a high chap, a fine fellow, a regular 
 young swell. He had somehow about him an air of im- 
 perious good-humour, and a royal frankness and maj- 
 esty, although he was only heir apparent to twopence- 
 halfpenny, and but one in descent from a gallypot. If 
 these positions are made for us, we acquiesce in them 
 very easily; and are always pretty ready to assume a 
 superiority over those who are as good as ourselves.
 
 476 PENDENNIS 
 
 Pen's condescension at this time of his life was a fine 
 thing to witness. Amongst men of ability this assump- 
 tion and impertinence passes off with extreme youth: 
 but it is curious to watch the conceit of a generous and 
 clever lad there is something almost touching in that 
 early exhibition of simplicity and folly. 
 
 So, after reading pretty hard of a morning, and, I 
 fear, not law merely, but politics and general history 
 and literature, which were as necessary for the advance- 
 ment and instruction of a young man as mere dry law, 
 after applying with tolerable assiduity to letters, to re- 
 views, to elemental books of law, and, above all, to the 
 newspaper, until the hour of dinner was drawing nigh, 
 these young gentlemen would sally out upon the town 
 with great spirits and appetite, and bent upon enjoying 
 a merry night as they had passed a pleasant forenoon. 
 It was a jovial time, that of four-and-twenty, when 
 every muscle of mind and body was in healthy action, 
 when the world was new as yet, and one moved over it 
 spurred onwards by good spirits and the delightful ca- 
 pability to enjoy. If ever we feel young afterwards, it 
 is with the comrades of that time: the tunes we hum in 
 our old age, are those we learned then. Sometimes, per- 
 haps, the festivity of that period revives in our memory ; 
 but how dingy the pleasure-garden has grown, how tat- 
 tered the garlands look, how scant and old the company, 
 and what a number of the lights have gone out since that 
 day! Grey hairs have come on like daylight streaming 
 in daylight and a headache with it. Pleasure has gone 
 to bed with the rouge on her cheeks. Well, friend, let 
 us walk through the day, sober and sad, but friendly. 
 
 I wonder what Laura and Helen would have said, 
 could they have seen, as they might not unfrequently
 
 PENDENNIS 477 
 
 have done had they been up and in London, in the very 
 early morning when the bridges began to blush in the 
 sunrise, and the tranquil streets of the city to shine in the 
 dawn, Mr. Pen and Mr. Warrington rattling over the 
 echoing flags towards the Temple, after one of their 
 wild nights of carouse nights wild, but not so wicked 
 as such nights sometimes are, for Warrington was a 
 woman-hater; and Pen, as we have said, too lofty to 
 stoop to a vulgar intrigue. Our young Prince of Fair- 
 oaks never could speak to one of the sex but with re- 
 spectful courtesy, and shrank from a coarse word or 
 gesture with instinctive delicacy for though we have 
 seen him fall in love with a fool, as his betters and in- 
 feriors have done, and as it is probable that he did more 
 than once in his life, yet for the time of the delusion it 
 was always as a Goddess that he considered her, and 
 chose to wait upon her. Men serve women kneeling 
 when they get on their feet, they go away. 
 
 That was what an acquaintance of Pen's said to him 
 in his hard homely way; an old friend with whom he 
 had fallen in again in London no other than honest 
 Mr. Bows of the Chatteris Theatre, who was now em- 
 ployed as piano-forte player, to accompany the eminent 
 lyrical talent which nightly delighted the public at the 
 Fielding's Head in Covent Garden: and where was 
 held the little club called the Back Kitchen. 
 
 Numbers of Pen's friends frequented this very merry 
 meeting. The Fielding's Head had been a house of en- 
 tertainment, almost since the time when the famous au- 
 thor of ' * Tom Jones ' ' presided as magistrate in the neigh- 
 bouring Bow Street; his place was pointed out, and the 
 chair said to have been his, still occupied by the presi- 
 dent of the night's entertainment. The worthy Cutts,
 
 478 PENDENNIS 
 
 the landlord of the Fielding's Head, generally occupied 
 this post when not disabled by gout or other illness. 
 His jolly appearance and fine voice may be remem- 
 bered by some of my male readers ; he used to sing pro- 
 fusely in the course of the harmonic meeting, and his 
 songs were of what may be called the British Brandy 
 and Water School of Song such as " The Good Old 
 English Gentleman," "Dear Tom, this Brown Jug," 
 and so forth songs in which pathos and hospitality are 
 blended, and the praises of good liquor and the social 
 affections are chanted in a barytone voice. The charms 
 of our women, the heroic deeds of our naval and mili- 
 tary commanders, are often sung in the ballads of this 
 school, and many a time in my youth have I admired 
 how Cutts the singer, after he had worked us all up to 
 patriotic enthusiasm, by describing the way in which the 
 brave Abercrombie received his death-wound, or made 
 us join him in tears, which he shed liberally himself, as 
 in faltering accents he told " how autumn's falling leaf 
 proclaimed the old man he must die " how Cutts the 
 singer became at once Cutts the landlord, and, before 
 the applause which we were making with our fists on his 
 table, in compliment to his heart-stirring melody, had 
 died away, was calling, " Now, gentlemen, give your 
 orders, the waiter's in the room John, a champagne 
 cup for Mr. Green. I think, sir, you said sausages 
 and mashed potatoes? John, attend on the gentle- 
 man." 
 
 " And I'll thank ye give me a glass of punch too, 
 John, and take care the wather boils," a voice would cry 
 not unfrequently, a well-known voice to Pen, which 
 made the lad blush and start when he heard it first 
 that of the venerable Captain Costigan; who was now
 
 PENDENNIS 479 
 
 established in London, and one of the great pillars of 
 the harmonic meetings at the Fielding's Head. 
 
 The Captain's manners and conversation brought 
 very many young men to the place. He was a char- 
 acter, and his fame had begun to spread soon after his 
 arrival in the metropolis, and especially after his daugh- 
 ter's marriage. He was great in his conversation to the 
 friend for the time being (who was the neighbour drink- 
 ing by his side) , about " me daughter." He told of her 
 marriage, and of the events previous and subsequent to 
 that ceremony; of the carriages she kept; of Mirabel's 
 adoration for her and for him; of the hunther pounds 
 which he was at perfect liberty to draw from his son-in- 
 law, whenever necessity urged him. And having stated 
 that it was his firm intention to "dthraw next Sathur- 
 day, I give ye me secred word and honour next Sathur- 
 day, the fourteenth, when ye'll see the money will be 
 handed over to me at Coutts's, the very instant I present 
 the cheque," the Captain would not unfrequently pro- 
 pose to borrow half-a-crown of his friend until the ar- 
 rival of that day of Greek Calends, when, on the honour 
 of an officer and a gentleman, he would repee the thri- 
 fling obligetion. 
 
 Sir Charles Mirabel had not that enthusiastic attach- 
 ment to his father-in-law, of which the latter sometimes 
 boasted (although in other stages of emotion Cos would 
 inveigh, with tears in his eyes, against the ingratitude of 
 the child of his bosom, and the stinginess of the wealthy 
 old man who had married her) ; but the pair had acted 
 not unkindly towards Costigan ; had settled a small pen- 
 sion on him, which was paid regularly, and forestalled 
 with even more regularity by poor Cos ; and the periods 
 of the payments were always well known by his friends
 
 480 PENDENNIS 
 
 at the Fielding's Head, whither the honest Captain took 
 care to repair, bank notes in hand, calling loudly for 
 change in the midst of the full harmonic meeting. " I 
 think ye'll find that note won't be refused at the Bank 
 of England, Cutts, my boy," Captain Costigan would 
 say. " Bows, have a glass? Ye needn't stint yourself 
 to-night, anyhow; and a glass of punch will make ye 
 play con spirito" For he was lavishly free with his 
 money when it came to him, and was scarcely known 
 to button his breeches pocket, except when the coin 
 was gone, or sometimes, indeed, when a creditor came 
 
 by- 
 
 It was in one of these moments of exultation that Pen 
 found his old friend swaggering at the singers' table at 
 the Back Kitchen of the Fielding's Head, and ordering 
 glasses of brandy and water for any of his acquaintances 
 who made their appearance in the apartment. War- 
 rington, who was on confidential terms with the bass 
 singer, made his way up to this quarter of the room, and 
 Pen walked at his friend's heels. 
 
 Pen started and blushed to see Costigan. He had 
 just come from Lady Whiston's party, where he had 
 met and spoken with the Captain's daughter again for 
 the first time after very old old days. He came up witli 
 outstretched hand, very kindly and warmly to greet 
 the old man ; still retaining a strong remembrance of the 
 time when Costigan's daughter had been everything in 
 the world to him. For though this young gentleman 
 may have been somewhat capricious in his attachments, 
 and occasionally have transferred his affections from 
 one woman to another, yet he always respected the place 
 where Love had dwelt, and, like the Sultan of Turkey, 
 desired that honours should be paid to the lady towards
 
 An old acquaintance
 
 PENDENXIS 481 
 
 whom he had once thrown the royal pocket-handker- 
 chief. 
 
 The tipsy Captain returned the clasp of Pen's hand 
 with all the strength of a palm which had become very 
 shaky by the constant lifting up of weights of brandy 
 and water, looked hard in Pen's face, and said, " Gre- 
 cious heavens, is it possible? Me dear boy, me dear fel- 
 low, me dear friend; " and then with a look of muddled 
 curiosity fairly broke down with, " I know your face, 
 me dear dear friend, but, bedad, I've forgot your 
 name." Five years of constant punch had passed since 
 Pen and Costigan met. Arthur was a good deal 
 changed, and the Captain may surely be excused for 
 forgetting him; when a man at the actual moment sees 
 things double, we may expect that his view of the past 
 will be rather muzzy. 
 
 Pen saw his condition and laughed, although, per- 
 haps, he was somewhat mortified. " Don't you remem- 
 ber me, Captain? " he said. " I am Pendennis Arthur 
 Pendennis, of Chatteris." 
 
 The sound of the young man's friendly voice recalled 
 and steadied Cos's tipsy remembrance, and he saluted 
 Arthur, as soon as he knew him, with a loud volley of 
 friendly greetings. Pen was his dearest boy, his gal- 
 lant young friend, his noble collagian, whom he had 
 held in his inmost heart ever since they had parted 
 how was his fawther, no, his mother, and his guardian, 
 the General, the Major. " I preshoom, from your ap- 
 pearance, that you've come into your prawpertee; and, 
 bedad, yee'll spend it like a man of spirit I'll go bail 
 for that. No! not yet come into your estete? If ye 
 want any thrifle, heark ye, there's poor old Jack Costi- 
 gan has got a guinea or two in his pocket and, be
 
 482 PENDENNIS 
 
 heavens! you shall never want, Awthur, me dear 
 boy. What'll ye have? John, come hither, and look 
 aloive; give this gentleman a glass of punch, and 
 I'll pay for't. Your friend? I've seen him before. 
 Permit me to have the honour of making meself 
 known to ye, sir, and requesting ye'll take a glass of 
 punch." 
 
 " I don't envy Sir Charles Mirabel his father-in-law," 
 thought Pendennis. " And how is my old friend, Mr. 
 Bows, Captain? Have you any news of him, and do 
 you see him still? " 
 
 " No doubt he's very well," said the Captain, jingling 
 his money, and whistling the air of a song ' The Lit- 
 tle Doodeen " for the singing of which he was cele- 
 brated at the Fielding's Head. " Me dear boy I've 
 forgot your name again but me name's Costigan, Jack 
 Costigan, and I'd loike ye to take as many tumblers of 
 punch in me name as ever ye loike. Ye know me name ; 
 I'm not ashamed of it." And so the Captain went 
 maundering on. 
 
 " It's pay-day with the General," said Mr. Hodgen, 
 the bass singer, with whom Warrington was in deep 
 conversation : " and he's a precious deal more than half - 
 seas over. He has already tried that ' Little Doodeen ' 
 of his, and broke it, too, just before I sang * King 
 Death.' Have you heard my new song, ' The Body 
 Snatcher,' Mr. Warrington? angcored at St. Bar- 
 tholomew's the other night composed expressly for 
 me. Per'aps you or your friend would like a copy of 
 the song, sir? John, just 'ave the kindness to 'and over 
 a ' Body Snatcher ' 'ere, will yer? There's a portrait of 
 me, sir, as I sing it as the Snatcher considered rather 
 like."
 
 PENDENNIS 483 
 
 "Thank you," said Warrington; "heard it nine 
 times know it by heart, Hodgen." 
 
 Here the gentleman who presided at the pianoforte 
 began to play upon his instrument, and Pen, looking in 
 the direction of the music, beheld that very Mr. Bows, 
 for whom he had been asking but now, and whose exist- 
 ence Costigan had momentarily forgotten. The little 
 old man sate before the battered piano (which had in- 
 jured its constitution wofully by sitting up so many 
 nights, and spoke with a voice, as it were, at once hoarse 
 and faint) , and accompanied the singers, or played with 
 taste and grace in the intervals of the songs. 
 
 Bows had seen and recollected Pen at once when the 
 latter came into the room, and had remarked the eager 
 warmth of the young man's recognition of Costigan. 
 He now began to play an air, which Pen instantly re- 
 membered as one which used to be sung by the chorus of 
 villagers in " The Stranger," just before Mrs. Haller 
 came in. It shook Pen as he heard it. He remembered 
 how his heart used to beat as that air was played, and 
 before the divine Emily made her entry. Nobody, save 
 Arthur, took any notice of old Bows's playing: it was 
 scarcely heard amidst the clatter of knives and forks, 
 the calls for poached eggs and kidneys, and the tramp 
 of guests and waiters. 
 
 Pen went up and kindly shook the player by the hand 
 at the end of his performance; and Bows greeted Ar- 
 thur with great respect and cordiality. ' What, you 
 haven't forgot the old tune, Mr. Pendennis? " he said; 
 " I thought you'd remember it. I take it, it was the 
 first tune of that sort you ever heard played wasn't it, 
 sir? You were quite a young chap then. I fear the 
 Captain's very bad to-night. He breaks out on a pay-
 
 484 PENDENNIS 
 
 day ; and I shall have the deuce's own trouble in getting 
 him home. We live together. We still hang on, sir, in 
 partnership, though Miss Em though my Lady Mira- 
 bel has left the firm. And so you remember old times, 
 do you? Wasn't she a beauty, sir? Your health and 
 my service to you," and he took a sip at the pewter 
 measure of porter which stood by his side as he played. 
 Pen had many opportunities of seeing his early ac- 
 quaintances afterwards, and of renewing his relations 
 with Costigan and the old musician. 
 
 As they sate thus in friendly colloquy, men of all sorts 
 and conditions entered and quitted the house of enter- 
 tainment; and Pen had the pleasure of seeing as many 
 different persons of his race, as the most eager observer 
 need desire to inspect. Healthy country tradesmen and 
 farmers, in London for their business, came and recre- 
 ated themselves with the jolly singing and suppers of 
 the Back Kitchen, squads of young apprentices and 
 assistants, the shutters being closed over the scene of 
 their labours, came hither, for fresh air doubtless, 
 rakish young medical students, gallant, dashing, what 
 is called "loudly" dressed, and (must it be owned?) 
 somewhat dirty, were here smoking and drinking, and 
 vociferously applauding the songs; young university 
 bucks were to be found here, too, with that indescribable 
 genteel simper which is only learned at the knees of 
 Alma Mater; and handsome young guardsmen, and 
 florid bucks from the St. James's Street Clubs; nay, 
 senators English and Irish: and even members of the 
 House of Peers. 
 
 The bass singer had made an immense hit with his 
 song of " The Body Snatcher," and the town rushed to
 
 PENDENNIS 485 
 
 listen to it. A curtain drew aside, and Mr. Hodgen ap- 
 peared in the character of the Snatcher, sitting on a 
 coffin, with a flask of gin before him, with a spade, and 
 a candle stuck in a skull. The song was sung with a 
 really admirable terrific humour. The singer's voice 
 went down so low, that its grumbles rumbled into the 
 hearer's awe-stricken soul ; and in the chorus he clamped 
 with his spade, and gave a demoniac " Ha! ha! " which 
 caused the very glasses to quiver on the table, as with 
 terror. None of the other singers, not even Cutts him- 
 self, as that high-minded man owned, could stand up 
 before the Snatcher, and he commonly used to retire to 
 Mrs. Cutts's private apartments, or into the bar, before 
 that fatal song extinguished him. Poor Cos's ditty, 
 ' The Little Doodeen," which Bows accompanied 
 charmingly on the piano, was sung but to a few admir- 
 ers, who might choose to remain after the tremendous 
 resurrectionist chant. The room was commonly emp- 
 tied after that, or only left in possession of a very few 
 and persevering votaries of pleasure. 
 
 Whilst Pen and his friend were sitting here together 
 one night, or rather morning, two habitues of the house 
 entered almost together. " Mr. Hoolan and Mr. 
 Doolan," whispered Warrington to Pen, saluting these 
 gentlemen, and in the latter Pen recognised his friend of 
 the Alacrity coach, who could not dine with Pen on the 
 day on which the latter had invited him, being compelled 
 by his professional duties to decline dinner-engage- 
 ments on Fridays, he had stated, with his compliments 
 to Mr. Pendennis. 
 
 Doolan's paper, the " Dawn," was lying on the table 
 much bestained by porter, and cheek-by-jowl with 
 Hoolan's paper, which we shall call the "Day;" the
 
 486 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Dawn " was liberal the " Day " was ultra conserva- 
 tive. Many of our Journals are officered by Irish gen- 
 tlemen, and their gallant brigade does the penning 
 among us, as their ancestors used to transact the fighting 
 in Europe; and engage under many a flag, to be good 
 friends when the battle is over. 
 
 " Kidneys, John, and a glass of stout," says Hoolan. 
 " How are you, Morgan? how's Mrs. Doolan? " 
 
 " Doing pretty well, thank ye, Mick, my boy faith, 
 she's accustomed to it," said Doolan. " How's the lady 
 that owns ye? Maybe I'll step down Sunday, and have 
 a glass of punch, Kilburn way." 
 
 " Don't bring Patsey with you, Morgan, for our 
 Georgy's got the measles," said the friendly Mick, and 
 they straightway fell to talk about matters connected 
 with their trade about the foreign mails about who 
 was correspondent at Paris, and who wrote from Ma- 
 dridabout the expense the " Morning Journal " was 
 at in sending couriers, about the circulation of the 
 " Evening Star," and so forth. 
 
 Warrington, laughing, took the " Dawn " which was 
 lying before him, and pointed to one of the leading arti- 
 cles in that journal, which commenced thus 
 
 " As rogues of note in former days who had some 
 wicked work to perform, an enemy to put out of the 
 way, a quantity of false coin to be passed, a lie to be told 
 or a murder to be done, employed a professional per- 
 jurer or assassin to do the work, which they were them- 
 selves too notorious or too cowardly to execute; our no- 
 torious contemporary, the ' Day/ engages smashers out 
 of doors to utter forgeries against individuals, and calls 
 in auxiliary cut-throats to murder the reputation of 
 those who offend him. A black vizarded ruffian (whom
 
 PENDENNIS 487 
 
 we will unmask), who signs the forged name of Tre- 
 foil, is at present one of the chief bravoes and bullies 
 in our contemporary's establishment. He is the eunuch 
 who brings the bowstring, and strangles at the order of 
 the ' Day.' We can convict this cowardly slave, and 
 propose to do so. The charge which he has brought 
 against Lord Bangbanagher, because he is a liberal 
 Irish peer, and against the Board of Poor Law Guar- 
 dians of the Bangbanagher Union, is," &c. 
 
 " How did they like the article at your place, Mick? " 
 asked Morgan ; " when the Captain puts his hand to it 
 he's a tremendous hand at a smasher. He wrote the 
 article in two hours in whew you know where, 
 while the boy was waiting." 
 
 " Our governor thinks the public don't mind a straw 
 about these newspaper rows, and has told the Docther 
 to stop answering," said the other. * Them two talked 
 it out together in my room. The Docther would have 
 liked a turn, for he says it's such easy writing, and re- 
 quires no reading up of a subject: but the governor put 
 a stopper on him." 
 
 ' The taste for eloquence is going out, Mick," said 
 Morgan. 
 
 " 'Deed then it is, Morgan," said Mick. " That was 
 fine writing when the Docther wrote in the ' Phaynix,' 
 and he and Condy Rooney blazed away at each other day 
 after day." 
 
 " And with powder and shot, too, as well as paper," 
 said Morgan. " Faith, the Docther was out twice, and 
 Condy Rooney winged his man." 
 
 " They are talking about Doctor Boyne and Captain 
 Shandon," Warrington said, " who are the two Irish 
 controversialists of the 'Dawn.' and the 'Day,' Dr.
 
 488 PENDENNIS 
 
 Boyne being the Protestant champion, and Captain 
 Shandon the liberal orator. They are the best friends 
 in the world, I believe, in spite of their newspaper con- 
 troversies; and though they cry out against the English 
 for abusing their country, by Jove they abuse it them- 
 selves more in a single article than we should take the 
 pains to do in a dozen volumes. How are you, 
 Doolan?" 
 
 ' Your servant, Mr. Warrington Mr. Pendennis, I 
 am delighted to have the honour of seeing ye again. 
 The night's journey on the top of the Alacrity was one 
 of the most agreeable I ever enjoyed in my life, and it 
 was your liveliness and urbanity that made the trip so 
 charming. I have often thought over that happy night, 
 sir, and talked over it to Mrs. Doolan. I have seen your 
 elegant young friend, Mr. Foker, too, here, sir, not un- 
 f requently. He is an occasional frequenter of this hos- 
 telry, and a right good one it is. Mr. Pendennis, when 
 I saw you I was on the ' Tom and Jerry ' Weekly 
 Paper; I have now the honour to be sub-editor of the 
 ' Dawn,' one of the best written papers of the empire " 
 and he bowed very slightly to Mr. Warrington. His 
 speech was unctuous and measured, his courtesy ori- 
 ental, his tone, when talking with the two Englishmen 
 quite different to that with which he spoke to his com- 
 rade. 
 
 'Why the devil will the fellow compliment so?" 
 growled Warrington, with a sneer which he hardly took 
 the pains to suppress. " Psha who comes here? all 
 Parnassus is abroad to-night: here's Archer. We shall 
 have some fun. Well, Archer, House up? " 
 
 " Haven't been there. I have been," said Archer, 
 with an air of mystery, " where I was wanted. Get me
 
 PENDENNIS 489 
 
 some supper, John something substantial. I hate 
 your grandees who give you nothing to eat. If it had 
 been at Apsley House, it would have been quite differ- 
 ent. The Duke knows what I like, and says to the 
 Groom of the Chambers, ' Martin, you will have some 
 cold beef, not too much done, and a pint bottle of pale 
 ale, and some brown sherry, ready in my study as usual ; 
 Archer is coming here this evening.' The Duke doesn't 
 eat supper himself, but he likes to see a man enjoy a 
 hearty meal, and he knows that I dine early. A man 
 can't live upon air, be hanged to him." 
 
 " Let me introduce you to my friend, Mr. Penden- 
 nis," Warrington said, with great gravity. " Pen, this 
 is Mr. Archer, whom you have heard me talk about. 
 You must know Pen's uncle, the Major, Archer, you 
 who know everybody? " 
 
 " Dined with him the day before yesterday at Gaunt 
 House," Archer said. ' We were four the French 
 Ambassador, Steyne, and we two commoners." 
 
 ' Why, my uncle is in Scot " Pen was going to 
 break out, but Warrington pressed his foot under the 
 table as a signal for him to be quiet. 
 
 " It was about the same business that I have been to 
 the palace to-night," Archer went on simply, " and 
 where I've been kept four hours, in an anteroom, with 
 nothing but yesterday's * Times,' which I knew by heart, 
 as I wrote three of the leading articles myself; and 
 though the Lord Chamberlain came in four times, and 
 once holding the royal teacup and saucer in his hand, 
 he did not so much as say to me, ' Archer, will you have 
 a cup of tea? ' 
 
 " Indeed! what is in the wind now? " asked Warring- 
 ton and turning to Pen, added, " You know, I sup-
 
 490 PENDENNIS 
 
 pose, that when there is anything wrong at court they 
 always send for Archer." 
 
 ' There is something wrong," said Mr. Archer, " and 
 as the story will be all over the town in a day or two I 
 don't mind telling it. At the last Chantilly races, where 
 I rode Brian Boru for my old friend the Duke de St. 
 Cloud the old King said to me, Archer, I'm uneasy 
 about Saint Cloud. I have arranged his marriage with 
 the Princess Marie Cunegonde; the peace of Europe 
 depends upon it for Russia will declare war if the 
 marriage does not take place, and the young fool is 
 so mad about Madame Massena, Marshal Massena's 
 wife, that he actually refuses to be a party to the 
 marriage. Well, sir, I spoke to Saint Cloud, and 
 having got him into pretty good humour by winning 
 the race, and a good bit of money into the bargain, 
 he said to me, * Archer, tell the Governor I'll think 
 of it.' " 
 
 " How do you say Governor in French? " asked Pen, 
 who piqued himself on knowing that language. 
 
 " Oh, we speak in English I taught him when we 
 were boys, and I saved his life at Twickenham, when he 
 fell out of a punt," Archer said. " I shall never forget 
 the Queen's looks as I brought him out of the water. 
 She gave me this diamond ring, and always calls me 
 Charles to this day." 
 
 " Madame Massena must be rather an old woman, 
 Archer," Warrington said. 
 
 " Dev'lish old old enough to be his grandmother; 
 I told him so," Archer answered at once. " But those 
 attachments for old women are the deuce and all. 
 That's what the King feels : that's what shocks the poor 
 Queen so much. They went away from Paris last Tues-
 
 PENDENNIS 491 
 
 day night, and are living at this present moment at 
 Jaunay's hotel." 
 
 " Has there been a private marriage, Archer? " asked 
 Warrington. 
 
 " Whether there has or not I don't know," Mr. Archer 
 replied ; "all I know is that I was kept waiting four 
 hours at the palace; that I never saw a man in such a 
 state of agitation as the King of Belgium when he came 
 out to speak to me, and that I'm devilish hungry and 
 here comes some supper." 
 
 " He has been pretty well to-night," said Warring- 
 ton, as the pair went home together: " but I have known 
 him in much greater force, and keeping a whole room 
 in a state of wonder. Put aside his archery practice, 
 that man is both able and honest a good man of busi- 
 ness, an excellent friend, admirable to his family as hus- 
 band, father, and son." 
 
 ' What is it makes him pull the long bow in that won- 
 derful manner? " 
 
 " An amiable insanity," answered Warrington. " He 
 never did anybody harm by his talk, or said evil of any- 
 body. He is a stout politician too, and would never 
 write a word or do an act against his party, as many of 
 us do." 
 
 " Of us! Who are we? " asked Pen. " Of what pro- 
 fession is Mr. Archer? " 
 
 " Of the Corporation of the Goosequill of the 
 Press, my boy," said Warrington ; " of the fourth 
 estate." 
 
 " Are you, too, of the craft, then? " Pendennis said. 
 
 ' We will talk about that another time," answered the 
 
 other. They were passing through the Strand as they 
 
 talked, and by a newspaper office, which was all lighted
 
 492 PENDENNIS 
 
 up and bright. Reporters were coming out of the place, 
 or rushing up to it in cabs ; there were lamps burning in 
 the editors' rooms, and above where the compositors 
 were at work: the windows of the building were in a 
 blaze of gas. 
 
 " Look at that, Pen," Warrington said. ' There she 
 is the great engine she never sleeps. She has her 
 ambassadors in every quarter of the world her couriers 
 upon every road. Her officers march along with armies, 
 and her envoys walk into statesmen's cabinets. They 
 are ubiquitous. Yonder journal has an agent, at this 
 minute, giving bribes at Madrid; and another inspect- 
 ing the price of potatoes in Covent Garden. Look ! here 
 comes the Foreign Express galloping in. They will be 
 able to give news to Downing Street to-morrow: funds 
 will rise or fall, fortunes be made or lost; Lord B. will 
 get up, and, holding the paper in his hand, and seeing 
 the noble marquis in his place, will make a great speech ; 
 and and Mr. Doolan will be called away from his sup- 
 per at the Back Kitchen; for he is foreign sub-editor, 
 and sees the mail on the newspaper sheet before he goes 
 to his own." 
 
 And so talking, the friends turned into their cham- 
 bers, as the dawn was beginning to peep.
 
 CHAPTER XXXI 
 
 IN WHICH THE PRINTER S DEVIL COMES 
 TO THE^ DOOR 
 
 EN, in the midst of his revels and 
 enjoyments, humble as they 
 were, and moderate in cost if 
 not in kind, saw an awful 
 sword hanging over him 
 which must drop down before 
 long and put an end to his 
 frolics and feasting. His 
 money was very nearly spent. 
 His club subscription had 
 carried away a third part of 
 it. He had paid for the chief 
 articles of furniture with 
 which he had supplied his lit- 
 tle bed-room: in fine, he was 
 come to the last five-pound 
 note in his pocket book, and 
 could think of no method of 
 
 providing a successor: for our friend had been bred up 
 like a young prince as yet, or as a child in arms whom his 
 mother feeds when it cries out. 
 
 Warrington did not know what his comrade's means 
 were. An only child, with a mother at her country 
 house, and an old dandy of an uncle who dined with a 
 great man every day, Pen might have a large bank at 
 
 493
 
 494 PENDENNIS 
 
 his command for anything that the other knew. He 
 had gold chains and a dressing-case fit for a lord. His 
 habits were those of an aristocrat, not that he was ex- 
 pensive upon any particular point, for he dined and 
 laughed over the pint of porter and the plate of beef 
 from the cook's shop with perfect content and good ap- 
 petite, but he could not adopt the penny-wise precau- 
 tions of life. He could not give twopence to a waiter; 
 he could not refrain from taking a cab if he had a mind 
 to do so, or if it rained, and as surely as he took the 
 cab he overpaid the driver. He had a scorn for cleaned 
 gloves and minor economies. Had he been bred to ten 
 thousand a year he could scarcely have been more free- 
 handed ; and for a beggar, with a sad story, or a couple 
 of pretty piteous-faced children, he never could resist 
 putting his hand into his pocket. It was a sumptuous 
 nature, perhaps, that could not be brought to regard 
 money ; a natural generosity and kindness ; and possibly 
 a petty vanity that was pleased with praise, even with 
 the praise of waiters and cabmen. I doubt whether the 
 wisest of us know what our own motives are, and 
 whether some of the actions of which we are the very 
 proudest will not surprise us when we trace them, as we 
 shall one day, to their source. 
 
 Warrington then did not know, and Pen had not 
 thought proper to confide to his friend, his pecuniary 
 history. That Pen had been wild and wickedly extrava- 
 gant at college, the other was aware; everybody at col- 
 lege was extravagant and wild ; but how great the son's 
 expenses had been, and how small the mother's means, 
 were points which had not been as yet submitted to Mr. 
 Warrington's examination. 
 
 At last the story came out, while Pen was grimly sur-
 
 PENDENNIS 495 
 
 veying the change for the last five-pound note, as it lay 
 upon the tray from the public-house by Mr. Warring- 
 ton's pot of ale. 
 
 " It is the last rose of summer," said Pen; " its bloom- 
 ing companions have gone long ago; and behold the 
 last one of the garland has shed its leaves; " and he told 
 Warrington the whole story which we know of his mo- 
 ther's means, of his own follies, of Laura's generosity; 
 during which time Warrington smoked his pipe and 
 listened intent. 
 
 " Impecuniosity will do you good," Pen's friend said, 
 knocking out the ashes at the end of the narration ; " I 
 don't know anything more wholesome for a man for 
 an honest man, mind you for another, the medicine 
 loses its effect than a state of tick. It is an alterative 
 and a tonic ; it keeps your moral man in a perpetual state 
 of excitement : as a man who is riding at a fence, or has 
 his opponent's single stick before him, is forced to look 
 his obstacle steadily in the face, and brace himself to re- 
 pulse or overcome it; a little necessity brings out your 
 pluck if you have any, and nerves you to grapple with 
 fortune. You will discover what a number of things 
 you can do without when you have no money to buy 
 them. You won't want new gloves and varnished boots, 
 eau de Cologne, and cabs to ride in. You have been 
 bred up as a molly-coddle, Pen, and spoilt by the wo- 
 men. A single man who has health and brains, and 
 can't find a livelihood in the world, doesn't deserve to 
 stay there. Let him pay his last halfpenny and jump 
 over Waterloo Bridge. Let him steal a leg of mutton 
 and be transported and get out of the country he is 
 not fit to live in it. Dixi ; I have spoken. Give us an- 
 other pull at the pale ale."
 
 496 PENDENNIS 
 
 * You have certainly spoken; but how is one to live? " 
 said Pen. ' There is beef and bread in plenty in Eng- 
 land, but you must pay for it with work or money. And 
 who will take my work? and what work can I do? " 
 
 Warrington burst out laughing. " Suppose we ad- 
 vertise in the ' Times,' " he said, " for an usher's place 
 at a classical and commercial academy A gentleman, 
 B.A. of St. Boniface College, Oxbridge, and who was 
 plucked for his degree " 
 
 " Confound you," cried Pen. 
 
 Wishes to give lessons in classics and mathematics, 
 and the rudiments of the French language; he can cut 
 hair, attend to the younger pupils, and play a second on 
 the piano with the daughters of the principal. Address 
 A.P., Lamb Court, Temple." 
 
 " Go on," said Pen, growling. 
 
 " Men take to all sorts of professions. Why, there is 
 your friend Bloundell Bloundell is a professional 
 blackleg, and travels the Continent, where he picks up 
 young gentlemen of fashion and fleeces them. There is 
 Bob O'Toole, with whom I was at school, who drives the 
 Ballynafad mail now, and carries honest Jack Finu- 
 cane's own correspondence to that city. I know a man, 
 sir, a doctor's son, like well, don't be angry, I meant 
 nothing offensive a doctor's son, I say, who was walk- 
 ing the hospitals here, and quarrelled with his governor 
 on questions of finance, and what did he do when he 
 came to his last five-pound note? he let his moustachios 
 grow, went into a provincial town, where he announced 
 himself as Professor Spineto, chiropodist to the Em- 
 peror of All the Russias, and by a happy operation on 
 the editor of the county newspaper, established himself 
 in practice, and lived reputably for three years. He
 
 PENDENNIS 497 
 
 has been reconciled to his family, and has now succeeded 
 to his father's gallypots." 
 
 " Hang gallypots," cried Pen. " I can't drive a 
 coach, cut corns, or cheat at cards. There's nothing else 
 you propose." 
 
 "Yes; there's our own correspondent," Warrington 
 said. " Every man has his secrets, look you. Before 
 you told me the story of your money-matters, I had no 
 idea but that you were a gentleman of fortune, for, with 
 your confounded airs and appearance, anybody would 
 suppose you to be so. From what you tell me about 
 your mother's income, it is clear that you must not lay 
 any more hands on it. You can't go on sponging upon 
 the women. You must pay off that trump of a girl. 
 Laura is her name? here's your health, Laura! and 
 carry a hod rather than ask for a shilling from home." 
 
 " But how earn one? " asked Pen. 
 
 " How .do I live, think you? " said the other. " On 
 my younger brother's allowance, Pendennis? I have 
 secrets of my own, my boy;" and here Warrington's 
 countenance fell. " I made away with that allowance 
 five years ago: if I had made away with myself a little 
 time before, it would have been better. I have played 
 off my own bat, ever since. I don't want much money. 
 When my purse is out, I go to work and fill it, and then 
 lie idle like a serpent or an Indian, until I have digested 
 the mass. Look, I begin to feel empty," Warrington 
 said, and showed Pen a long lean purse, with but a few 
 sovereigns at one end of it. 
 
 " But how do you fill it? " said Pen. 
 
 " I write," said Warrington. " I don't tell the world 
 that I do so," he added, with a blush. " I do not choose 
 that questions should be asked: or, perhaps, I am an
 
 498 PENDENNIS 
 
 ass, and don't wish it to be said that George Warring- 
 ton writes for bread. But I write in the Law Reviews : 
 look here, these articles are mine." And he turned over 
 some sheets. " I write in a newspaper now and then, of 
 which a friend of mine is editor." And Warrington, 
 going with Pendennis to the club one day, called for a 
 file of the " Dawn," and pointed with his finger silently 
 to one or two articles, which Pen read with delight. He 
 had no difficulty in recognising the style afterwards 
 the strong thoughts and curt periods, the sense, the sa- 
 tire, and the scholarship. 
 
 " I am not up to this," said Pen, with a genuine ad- 
 miration of his friend's powers. " I know very little 
 about politics or history, Warrington; and have but a 
 smattering of letters. I can't fly upon such a wing as 
 yours." 
 
 " But you can on your own, my boy, which is lighter, 
 and soars higher, perhaps," the other said, good-na- 
 turedly. " Those little scraps and verses which I have 
 seen of yours show me, what is rare in these days, a 
 natural gift, sir. You needn't blush, you conceited 
 young jackanapes. You have thought so yourself any 
 time these ten years. You have got the sacred flame 
 a little of the real poetical fire, sir, I think; and all our 
 oil-lamps are nothing, compared to that, though ever so 
 well trimmed. You are a poet, Pen, my boy," and so 
 speaking, Warrington stretched out his broad hand, and 
 clapped Pen on the shoulder. 
 
 Arthur was so delighted that the tears came into his 
 eyes. "How kind you are to me, Warrington!" he 
 said. 
 
 ' I like you, old boy," said the other. " I was dev'lish 
 lonely in chambers and wanted somebody, and the sight
 
 PENDENNIS 499 
 
 of your honest face somehow pleased me. I liked the 
 way you laughed at Lowton that poor good little snob. 
 And, in fine, the reason why I cannot tell but so it is, 
 young 'un. I'm alone in the world, sir; and I wanted 
 some one to keep me company; " and a glance of ex- 
 treme kindness and melancholy passed out of Warring- 
 ton's dark eyes. 
 
 Pen was too much pleased with his own thoughts to 
 perceive the sadness of the friend who was compliment- 
 ing him. " Thank you, Warrington," he said, " thank 
 you for your friendship to me, and and what you say 
 about me. I have often thought I was a poet. I will 
 be one I think I am one, as you say so, though the 
 world mayn't. Is it is it the Ariadne in Naxos which 
 you liked ( I was only eighteen when I wrote it ) , or the 
 Prize Poem?" 
 
 Warrington burst into a roar of laughter. ' Why, 
 you young goose," he yelled out " of all the miserable 
 weak rubbish I ever tried, Ariadne in Naxos is the most 
 mawkish and disgusting. The Prize Poem is so pom- 
 pous and feeble, that I'm positively surprised, sir, it 
 didn't get the medal. You don't suppose that you are 
 a serious poet, do you, and are going to cut out Milton 
 and ^schylus? Are you setting up to be a Pindar, you 
 absurd little torn-tit, and fancy you have the strength 
 and pinion which the Theban eagles bear, sailing with 
 supreme dominion through the azure fields of air? No, 
 my boy, I think you can write a magazine article, and 
 turn out a pretty copy of verses ; that's what I think of 
 
 you." 
 
 "By Jove!" said Pen, bouncing up and stamping 
 his foot, " I'll show you that I am a better man than 
 vou think for."
 
 500 PENDENNIS 
 
 Warrington only laughed the more, and blew twenty- 
 four puffs rapidly out of his pipe by way of reply to 
 Pen. 
 
 An opportunity for showing his skill presented itself 
 before very long. That eminent publisher, Mr. Bacon 
 (formerly Bacon and Bungay) of Paternoster Row, 
 besides being the proprietor of the " Legal Review," in 
 which Mr. Warrington wrote, and of other periodicals of 
 note and gravity, used to present to the world every year 
 a beautiful gilt volume called the " Spring Annual," 
 edited by the Lady Violet Lebas, and numbering 
 amongst its contributors not only the most eminent, but 
 the most fashionable poets of our time. Young Lord 
 Dodo's poems first appeared in this miscellany the 
 Honourable Percy Popjoy, whose chivalrous ballads 
 have obtained him such a reputation Bedwin Sands's 
 Eastern Ghazuls, and many more of the works of our 
 young nobles were first given to the world in the 
 " Spring Annual," which has since shared the fate of 
 other vernal blossoms, and perished out of the world. 
 The book was daintily illustrated with pictures of reign- 
 ing beauties, or other prints of a tender and voluptuous 
 character; and, as these plates were prepared long be- 
 forehand, requiring much time in engraving, it was the 
 eminent poets who had to write to the plates, and not the 
 painters who illustrated the poems. 
 
 One day, just when this volume was on the eve of 
 publication, it chanced that Mr. Warrington called in 
 Paternoster Row to talk with Mr. Hack, Mr. Bacon's 
 reader and general manager of publications for Mr. 
 Bacon, not having the least taste in poetry or in litera- 
 ture of any kind, wisely employed the services of a pro-
 
 PENDENNIS 501 
 
 fessional gentleman. Warrington, then, going into 
 Mr. Hack's room on business of his own, found that 
 gentleman with a bundle of proof plates and sheets of 
 the " Spring Annual " before him, and glanced at some 
 of them. 
 
 Percy Popjoy had written some verses to illustrate 
 one of the pictures, which was called the Church Porch. 
 A Spanish damsel was hastening to church with a large 
 prayer-book; a youth in a cloak was hidden in a niche 
 watching this young woman. The picture was pretty: 
 but the great genius of Percy Popjoy had deserted him, 
 for he had made the most execrable verses which ever 
 were perpetrated by a young nobleman.
 
 502 PENDENNIS 
 
 Warrington burst out laughing as he read the poem: 
 and Mr. Hack laughed too, but with rather a rueful 
 face. " It won't do," he said, " the public won't stand 
 it. Bungay's people are going to bring out a very good 
 book, and have set up Miss Bunion against Lady Violet. 
 We have most titles to be sure but the verses are too 
 bad. Lady Violet herself owns it; she's busy with her 
 own poem; what's to be done? We can't lose the plate. 
 The governor gave sixty pounds for it! " 
 
 " I know a fellow who would do some verses, I 
 think," said Warrington. " Let me take the plate 
 home in my pocket: and send to my chambers in 
 the morning for the verses. You'll pay well, of 
 course? " 
 
 " Of course," said Mr. Hack ; and Warrington, hav- 
 ing dispatched his own business, went home to Mr. Pen, 
 plate in hand. 
 
 " Now, boy, here's a chance for you. Turn me off a 
 copy of verses to this." 
 
 "What's this? A Church Porch A lady entering 
 it, and a youth out of a wine-shop window ogling her. 
 What the deuce am I to do with it? " 
 
 " Try," said Warrington. " Earn your livelihood 
 for once, you who long so to do it." 
 
 " Well, I will try," said Pen. 
 
 " And I'll go out to dinner," said Warrington, and 
 left Mr. Pen in a brown study. 
 
 When Warrington came home that night, at a very 
 late hour, the verses were done. ' There they are," said 
 Pen. " I've screwed 'em out at last. I think they'll 
 do." 
 
 ' I think they will," said Warrington, after reading 
 them; they ran as follows:
 
 PENDENNIS 503 
 
 THE CHURCH PORCH. 
 
 Although I enter not, 
 Yet round about the spot 
 
 Sometimes I hover, 
 And at the sacred gate, 
 With longing eyes I wait, 
 
 Expectant of her. 
 
 The Minster bell tolls out 
 Above the city's rout 
 
 And noise and humming: 
 They've stopp'd the chiming bell, 
 I hear the organ's swell 
 
 She's coming, she's coming! 
 
 My lady comes at last, 
 Timid and stepping fast, 
 
 And hastening hither, 
 With modest eyes downcast. 
 She comes she's here she's past. 
 
 May Heaven go with her! 
 
 Kneel undisturb'd, fair saint, 
 Pour out your praise or plaint 
 
 Meekly and duly. 
 I will not enter there, 
 To sully your pure prayer 
 
 With thoughts unruly. 
 
 But suffer me to pace 
 Round the forbidden place, 
 
 Lingering a minute, 
 Like outcast spirits, who wait 
 And see through Heaven's gate 
 
 Angels within it. >
 
 504 PENDENNIS 
 
 "Have you got any more, young fellow?" asked 
 Warrington. We must make them give you a couple 
 of guineas a page; and if the verses are liked, why, 
 you'll get an entree into Bacon's magazines, and may 
 turn a decent penny." 
 
 Pen examined his portfolio and found another ballad 
 which he thought might figure with advantage in the 
 " Spring Annual," and consigning these two precious 
 documents to Warrington, the pair walked from the 
 Temple, to the famous haunt of the Muses and their 
 masters, Paternoster Row. Bacon's shop was an an- 
 cient low-browed building, with a few of the books pub- 
 lished by the firm displayed in the windows, under a 
 bust of my Lord of Verulam, and the name of Mr. 
 Bacon in brass on the private door. Exactly opposite 
 to Bacon's house was that of Mr. Bungay, which was 
 newly painted and elaborately decorated in the style of 
 the seventeenth century, so that you might have fancied 
 stately Mr. Evelyn passing over the threshold, or curi- 
 ous Mr. Pepys examining the books in the window. 
 Warrington went into the shop of Mr. Bacon, but Pen 
 stayed without. It was agreed that his ambassador 
 should act for him entirely ; and the young fellow paced 
 up and down the street in a very nervous condition, 
 until he should learn the result of the negotiation. 
 Many a poor devil before him has trodden those flags, 
 with similar cares and anxieties at his heels, his bread 
 and his fame dependent upon the sentence of his mag- 
 nanimous patrons of the Row. Pen looked at all the 
 wonders of all the shops; and the strange variety of lit- 
 erature which they exhibit. In this were displayed 
 black-letter volumes and books in the clear pale types 
 of Aldus and Elzevir: in the next, you might see the
 
 PENDENNIS 505 
 
 " Penny Horrific Register; " the " Halfpenny Annals 
 of Crime," and " History of the most celebrated mur- 
 derers of all countries," " The Raff's Magazine," " The 
 Larky Swell," and other publications of the penny 
 press; whilst at the next window, portraits of ill- 
 favoured individuals, with fac-similes of the venerated 
 signatures of the Reverend Grimes Wapshot, the Rev- 
 erend Elias Howie, and the works written and the ser- 
 mons preached by them, showed the British Dissenter 
 where he could find mental pabulum. Hard by would 
 be a little casement hung with emblems, with medals 
 and rosaries, with little paltry prints of saints gilt and 
 painted, and books of controversial theology, by which 
 the faithful of the Roman opinion might learn a short 
 way to deal with Protestants, at a penny apiece, or 
 ninepence the dozen for distribution; whilst in the very 
 next window you might see " Come out of Rome," a 
 sermon preached at the opening of the Shepherd's Bush 
 College, by John Thomas Lord Bishop of Ealing. 
 Scarce an opinion but has its expositor and its place of 
 exhibition in this peaceful old Paternoster Row, under 
 the toll of the bells of Saint Paul. 
 
 Pen looked in at all the windows and shops, as a gen- 
 tleman, who is going to have an interview with the den- 
 tist, examines the books on the waiting-room table. He 
 remembered them afterwards. It seemed to him that 
 Warrington would never come out; and indeed the lat- 
 ter was engaged for some time in pleading his friend's 
 cause. 
 
 Pen's natural conceit would have swollen immensely 
 if he could but have heard the report which Warrington 
 gave of him. It happened that Mr. Bacon himself had 
 occasion to descend to Mr. Hack's room whilst War-
 
 506 PENDENNIS 
 
 rington was talking there, and Warrington, knowing 
 Bacon's weaknesses, acted upon them with great adroit- 
 ness in his friend's behalf. In the first place, he put on 
 his hat to speak to Bacon, and addressed him from the 
 table on which he seated himself. Bacon liked to be 
 treated with rudeness by a gentleman, and used to pass 
 it on to his inferiors as boys pass the mark. ' What ! not 
 know Mr. Pendennis, Mr. Bacon?" Warrington said. 
 " You can't live much in the world, or you would know 
 him. A man of property in the West, of one of the 
 most ancient families in England, related to half the 
 nobility in the empire he's cousin to Lord Pontypool 
 he was one of the most distinguished men at Ox- 
 bridge; he dines at Gaunt House every week." 
 
 " Law bless me, you don't say so, sir. Well really 
 Law bless me now," said Mr. Bacon. 
 
 " I have just been showing Mr. Hack some of his 
 verses, which he sat up last night, at my request, to 
 write; and Hack talks about giving him a copy of the 
 book the what-d'-you-call-'em." 
 
 " Law bless me now, does he? The what-d'-you-call- 
 'em. Indeed!" 
 
 " ' The Spring Annual ' is its name, as payment for 
 these verses. You don't suppose that such a man as Mr. 
 Arthur Pendennis gives up a dinner at Gaunt House 
 for nothing? You know, as well as anybody, that the 
 men of fashion want to be paid." 
 
 ' That they do, Mr. Warrington, sir," said the pub- 
 lisher. 
 
 " I tell you he's a star; he'll make a name, sir. He's 
 a new man, sir." 
 
 ' They've said that of so many of those young swells, 
 Mr. Warrington," the publisher interposed, with a sigh.
 
 PENDENNIS 507 
 
 * There was Lord Viscount Dodo, now; I gave his 
 Lordship a good bit of money for his poems, and only 
 sold eighty copies. Mr. Pop joy's Hadgincourt, sir, fell 
 dead." 
 
 ' Well, then, I'll take my man over to Bungay," 
 Warrington said, and rose from the table. This threat 
 was too much for Mr. Bacon, who was instantly ready 
 to accede to any reasonable proposal of Mr. Warring- 
 ton's, and finally asked his manager what those pro- 
 posals were? When he heard that the negotiation only 
 related as yet to a couple of ballads, which Mr. War- 
 rington offered for the " Spring Annual," Mr. Bacon 
 said, " Law bless you, give him a cheque directly ; " and 
 with this paper Warrington went out to his friend, and 
 placed it, grinning, in Pen's hands. Pen was as elated 
 as if somebody had left him a fortune. He offered 
 Warrington a dinner at Richmond instantly. " What 
 should he go and buy for Laura and his mother? He 
 must buy something for them." 
 
 * They'll like the book better than anything else," 
 said Warrington, " with the young one's name to the 
 verses, printed among the swells." 
 
 " Thank God! thank God! " cried Arthur, " I needn't 
 be a charge upon the old mother. I can pay off Laura 
 now. I can get my own living. I can make my own way." 
 
 " I can marry the grand vizier's daughter: I can pur- 
 chase a house in Belgrave Square; I can build a fine 
 castle in the air;" said Warrington, pleased with the 
 other's exultation. ' Well, you may get bread and 
 cheese, Pen: and I own it tastes well, the bread which 
 you earn yourself." 
 
 They had a magnum of claret at dinner at the club 
 that day, at Pen's charges. It was long since he had in-
 
 508 PENDENNIS 
 
 dulged in such a luxury, but Warrington would not 
 baulk him : and they drank together to the health of the 
 " Spring Annual." 
 
 It never rains but it pours, according to the proverb; 
 so very speedily another chance occurred, by which Mr. 
 Pen was to be helped in his scheme of making a liveli- 
 hood. Warrington one day threw him a letter across the 
 table, which was brought by a printer's boy, " from 
 Captain Shandon, sir " the little emissary said : and 
 then went and fell asleep on his accustomed bench in 
 the passage. He paid many a subsequent visit there, 
 and brought many a message to Pen. 
 
 " F. P. Tuesday Morning. 
 " MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 " Bungay will be here to-day, about the ' Pall-Mall Gazette.' 
 You would be the very man to help us with a genuine West-end 
 article, you understand dashing, trenchant, and d aris- 
 tocratic. Lady Hipshaw will write; but she's not much you 
 know, and we've two lords ; but the less they do the better. We 
 must have you. We'll give you your own terms, and we'll make 
 a hit with the * Gazette.' 
 
 " Shall B. come and see you, or can you look in upon me here? 
 
 " Ever yours, 
 
 " C. S." 
 
 " Some more opposition," Warrington said, when Pen 
 had read the note. " Bungay and Bacon are at daggers 
 drawn; each married the sister of the other, and they 
 were for some time the closest friends and partners. 
 Hack says it was Mrs. Bungay who caused all the mis- 
 chief between the two ; whereas Shandon, who reads for 
 Bungay a good deal, says Mrs. Bacon did the business ; 
 but I don't know which is right, Peachum or Lockit.
 
 PENDENNIS 509 
 
 Since they have separated, it is a furious war between 
 the two publishers; and no sooner does one bring out 
 a book of travels, or poems, a magazine or periodical, 
 quarterly, or monthly, or weekly, or annual, but the rival 
 is in the field with something similar. I have heard poor 
 Shandon tell with great glee how he made Bungay give 
 a grand dinner at Blackwall to all his writers, by saying 
 that Bacon had invited his corps to an entertainment at 
 Greenwich. When Bungay engaged your celebrated 
 friend Mr. Wagg to edit the ' Londoner,' Bacon 
 straightway rushed off and secured Mr. Grindle to give 
 his name to the ' Westminster Magazine.' When Bacon 
 brought out his comic Irish novel of ' Barney Bralla- 
 ghan,' off went Bungay to Dublin, and produced his rol- 
 licking Hibernian story of ' Looney Mac Twolter.' 
 When Doctor Hicks brought out his ' Wanderings in 
 Mesopotamia ' under Bacon's auspices, Bungay pro- 
 duced Professor Sadiman's ' Researches in Zahara ; ' and 
 Bungay is publishing his ' Pall-Mall Gazette ' as a coun- 
 terpoise to Bacon's * Whitehall Review.' Let us go and 
 hear about the ' Gazette.' There may be a place for 
 you in it, Pen, my boy. We will go and see Shandon. 
 We are sure to find him at home." 
 
 ' Where does he live? " asked Pen. 
 
 " In the Fleet Prison," Warrington said. " And very 
 much at home he is there too. He is the king of the 
 place." 
 
 Pen had never seen this scene of London life, and 
 walked with no small interest in at the grim gate of that 
 dismal edifice. They went through the ante-room, where 
 the officers and janitors of the place were seated, and 
 passing in at the wicket, entered the prison. The noise 
 and the crowd, the life and the shouting, the shabby bus-
 
 510 PENDENNIS 
 
 tie of the place, struck and excited Pen. People moved 
 about ceaselessly and restless, like caged animals in a 
 menagerie. Men were playing at fives. Others pacing 
 and tramping: this one in colloquy with his lawyer in 
 dingy black that one walking sadly, with his wife by 
 his side, and a child on his arm. Some were arrayed in 
 tattered dressing gowns, and had a look of rakish fash- 
 ion. Everybody seemed to be busy, humming, and on 
 the move. Pen felt as if he choked in the place, and as 
 if the door being locked upon him they never would let 
 him out. 
 
 They went through a court up a stone staircase, and 
 through passages full of people, and noise, and cross 
 lights, and black doors clapping and banging; Pen 
 feeling as one does in a feverish morning-dream. At 
 last the same little runner who had brought Shandon's 
 note, and had followed them down Fleet Street munch- 
 ing apples, and who showed the way to the two gentle- 
 men through the prison, said, " This is the Captain's 
 door," and Mr. Shandon's voice from within bade them 
 enter. 
 
 The room, though bare, was not uncheerful. The sun 
 was shining in at the window near which sate a lady 
 at work, who had been gay and beautiful once, but in 
 whose faded face kindness and tenderness still beamed. 
 Through all his errors and reckless mishaps and misfor- 
 tunes, this faithful creature adored her husband, and 
 thought him the best and cleverest, as indeed he was one 
 of the kindest of men. Nothing ever seemed to disturb 
 the sweetness of his temper; not debts; not duns: not 
 misery: not the bottle: not his wife's unhappy position, 
 or his children's ruined chances. He was perfectly fond 
 of wife and children after his fashion : he always had the
 
 The Pall Mall Gazette
 
 PENDENNIS 511 
 
 kindest words and smiles for them, and ruined them with 
 the utmost sweetness of temper. He never could refuse 
 himself or any man any enjoyment which his money 
 could purchase; he would share his last guinea with 
 Jack and Tom, and we may be sure he had a score of 
 such retainers. He would sign his name at the back of 
 any man's bill, and never pay any debt of his own. He 
 would write on any side, and attack himself or another 
 man with equal indifference. He was one of the witti- 
 est, the most amiable, and the most incorrigible of Irish- 
 men. Nobody could help liking Charley Shandon who 
 saw him once, and those whom he ruined could scarcely 
 be angry with him. 
 
 When Pen and Warrington arrived, the Captain (he 
 had been in an Irish militia regiment once, and the title 
 remained with him) was sitting on his bed in a torn 
 dressing-gown, with a desk on his knees, at which he 
 was scribbling as fast as his rapid pen could write. Slip 
 after slip of paper fell off the desk wet on to the ground. 
 A picture of his children was hung up over his bed, and 
 the youngest of them was pattering about the room. 
 
 Opposite the Captain sate Mr. Bungay, a portly man 
 of stolid countenance, with whom the little child had 
 been trying a conversation. 
 
 ' Papa's a very clever man," said she; " mamma says 
 so." 
 
 " Oh, very," said Mr. Bungay. 
 
 " And you're a very rich man, Mr. Bundy," cried the 
 child, who could hardly speak plain. 
 
 " Mary! " said Mamma, from her work. 
 
 " Oh, never mind," Bungay roared out with a great 
 laugh; "no harm in saying I'm rich he, he I am 
 pretty well off, my little dear."
 
 512 PENDENNIS 
 
 " If you're rich, why don't you take papa out of 
 piz'n? " asked the child. 
 
 Mamma at this began to wipe her eyes with the work 
 on which she was employed. ( The poor lady had hung 
 curtains up in the room, had brought the children's pic- 
 ture and placed it there, and had made one or two at- 
 tempts to ornament it.) Mamma began to cry; Mr. 
 Bungay turned red, and looked fiercely out of his blood- 
 shot little eyes; Shandon's pen went on, and Pen and 
 Warrington arrived with their knock. 
 
 Captain Shandon looked up from his work. " How 
 do you do, Mr. Warrington," he said. " I'll speak to 
 you in a minute. Please sit down, gentlemen, if you can 
 find places," and away went the pen again. 
 
 Warrington pulled forward an old portmanteau the 
 only available seat and sate down on it with a bow to 
 Mrs. Shandon, and a nod to Bungay; the child came 
 and looked at Pen solemnly ; and in a couple of minutes 
 the swift scribbling ceased; and Shandon, turning the 
 desk over on the bed, stooped and picked up the papers. 
 
 " I think this will do," said he. " It's the prospectus 
 for the * Pall-Mali Gazette.' " 
 
 " And here's the money for it," Mr. Bungay said, lay- 
 ing down a five-pound note. " I'm as good as my word, 
 I am. When I say I'll pay, I pay." 
 
 " Faith that's more than some of us can say," said 
 Shandon, and he eagerly clapped the note into his 
 pocket.
 
 CHAPTER XXXII 
 
 WHICH IS PASSED IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF 
 LUDGATE HILL 
 
 UR imprisoned Cap- 
 tain announced, 
 in smart and em- 
 phatic language 
 in his prospectus, 
 that the time had 
 come at last when 
 it was necessary 
 for the gentlemen 
 of England to 
 band together in 
 defence of their 
 common rights, 
 and their glorious 
 order, menaced on 
 all sides by for- 
 eign revolutions, by intestine radicalism, by the artful 
 calumnies of mill-owners and cotton-lords, and the stupid 
 hostility of the masses whom they gulled and led. ' The 
 ancient monarchy was insulted," the Captain said, " by 
 a ferocious republican rabble. The Church was deserted 
 by envious dissent, and undermined by stealthy infidel- 
 ity. The good institutions, which had made our country 
 glorious, and the name of English Gentlemen the proud- 
 est in the world, were left without defence, and exposed 
 
 sis
 
 514 PENDENNIS 
 
 to assault and contumely from men to whom no sanctu- 
 ary was sacred, for they believed in nothing holy; no 
 history venerable, for they were too ignorant to have 
 heard of the past; and no law was binding which they 
 were strong enough to break, when their leaders gave the 
 signal for plunder. It was because the kings of France 
 mistrusted their gentlemen," Mr. Shandon remarked, 
 " that the monarchy of Saint Louis went down: it was 
 because the people of England still believed in their 
 gentlemen, that this country encountered and overcame 
 the greatest enemy a nation ever met: it was because 
 we were headed by gentlemen that the Eagles retreated 
 before us from the Douro to the Garonne : it was a gen- 
 tleman who broke the line at Trafalgar, and swept the 
 plain of Waterloo." 
 
 Bungay nodded his head in a knowing manner, and 
 winked his eyes when the Captain came to the Waterloo 
 passage: and Warrington burst out laughing. 
 
 * You see how our venerable friend Bungay is af- 
 fected," Shandon said, slily looking up from his papers 
 
 " that's your true sort of test. I have used the Duke 
 of Wellington and the battle of Waterloo a hundred 
 times: and I never knew the Duke to fail." 
 
 The Captain then went on to confess, with much can- 
 dour, that up to the present time the gentlemen of Eng- 
 land, confident of their right, and careless of those who 
 questioned it, had left the political interest of their order 
 as they did the management of their estates, or the set- 
 tlement of their legal affairs, to persons affected to 
 each peculiar service, and had permitted their interests 
 to be represented in the press by professional proctors 
 and advocates. That time Shandon professed to con- 
 sider was now gone by: the gentlemen of England must
 
 PENDENNIS 515 
 
 be their own champions: the declared enemies of their 
 order were brave, strong, numerous, and uncompromis- 
 ing. They must meet their foes in the field : they must 
 not be belied and misrepresented by hireling advocates: 
 they must not have Grub Street publishing Gazettes 
 from Whitehall; "that's a dig at Bacon's people, Mr. 
 Bungay," said Shandon, turning round to the publisher. 
 
 Bungay clapped his stick on the floor. " Hang him, 
 pitch into him, Capting," he said with exultation: and 
 turning to Warrington, wagged his dull head more ve- 
 hemently than ever, and said, " For a slashing article, 
 sir, there's nobody like the Capting no-o-body like 
 him." 
 
 The prospectus-writer went on to say that some gen- 
 tlemen, whose names were, for obvious reasons, not 
 brought before the public (at which Mr. Warrington 
 began to laugh again) , had determined to bring forward 
 a journal, of which the principles were so and so. " These 
 men are proud of their order, and anxious to uphold it," 
 cried out Captain Shandon, flourishing his paper with 
 a grin. " They are loyal to their sovereign, by faithful 
 conviction and ancestral allegiance; they love their 
 Church, where they would have their children worship, 
 and for which their forefathers bled; they love their 
 country, and would keep it what the gentlemen of Eng- 
 land yes, the gentlemen of England (we'll have that 
 in large caps, Bungay, my boy) have made it the great- 
 est and freest in the world: and as the names of some 
 of them are appended to the deed which secured our 
 liberties at Runnymede 
 
 " What's that? " asked Mr. Bungay. 
 
 " An ancestor of mine sealed it with his sword hilt," 
 Pen said, with great gravity.
 
 516 PENDENNIS 
 
 " It's the Habeas Corpus, Mr. Bungay," Warrington 
 said, on which the publisher answered, " All right, I dare 
 say," and yawned, though he said, " Go on, Capting." 
 
 "at Runnymede; they are ready to defend that 
 freedom to-day with sword and pen, and now, as then, 
 to rally round the old laws and liberties of England." 
 
 " Brayvo! " cried Warrington. The little child stood 
 wondering; the lady was working silently, and looking 
 with fond admiration. " Come here, little Mary," said 
 Warrington, and patted the child's fair curls with his 
 large hand. But she shrank back from his rough caress, 
 and preferred to go and take refuge at Pen's knee, and 
 play with his fine watch-chain: and Pen was very much 
 pleased that she came to him; for he was very soft- 
 hearted and simple, though he concealed his gentleness 
 under a shy and pompous demeanour. So she clam- 
 bered up on his lap, whilst her father continued to read 
 his programme. 
 
 ' You were laughing," the Captain said to Warring- 
 ton, " about * the obvious reasons ' which I mentioned. 
 Now, I'll show ye what they are, ye unbelieving heathen. 
 ' We have said/ " he went on, " * that we cannot give the 
 names of the parties engaged in this undertaking, and 
 that there were obvious reasons for that concealment. 
 We number influential friends in both Houses of the 
 Senate, and have secured allies in every diplomatic circle 
 in Europe. Our sources of intelligence are such as can- 
 not, by any possibility, be made public and, indeed, such 
 as no other London or European journal could, by any 
 chance, acquire. But this we are free to say, that the 
 very earliest information connected with the movement 
 of English and Continental politics, will be found ONLY 
 in the columns of the " Pall Mall Gazette." The States-
 
 PENDENNIS 517 
 
 man and the Capitalist, the Country Gentleman, and the 
 Divine, will be amongst our readers, because our writers 
 are amongst them. We address ourselves to the higher 
 circles of society: we care not to disown it the " Pall 
 Mall Gazette " is written by gentlemen for gentlemen; 
 its conductors speak to the classes in which they live and 
 were born. The field-preacher has his journal, the rad- 
 ical free-thinker has his journal: why should the Gentle- 
 men of England be unrepresented in the Press? ' 
 
 Mr. Shandon then went on with much modesty to 
 descant upon the literary and fashionable departments 
 of the " Pall Mall Gazette," which were to be conducted 
 by gentlemen of acknowledged reputation ; men famous 
 at the Universities (at which Mr. Pendennis could 
 scarcely help laughing and blushing), known at the 
 Clubs and of the Society which they described. He 
 pointed out delicately to advertisers that there would be 
 no such medium as the " Pall Mall Gazette " for giving 
 publicity to their sales; and he eloquently called upon 
 the nobility of England, the baronetage of England, the 
 revered clergy of England, the bar of England, the ma- 
 trons, the daughters, the homes and hearths of England, 
 to rally round the good old cause; and Bungay at the 
 conclusion of the reading woke up from a second snooze 
 in which he had indulged himself, and again said it was 
 all right. 
 
 The reading of the prospectus concluded, the gentle- 
 men present entered into some details regarding the 
 political and literary management of the paper, and 
 Mr. Bungay sate by listening and nodding his head, as 
 if he understood what was the subject of their conversa- 
 tion, and approved of their opinions. Bungay 's opin- 
 ions, in truth, were pretty simple. . He thought the Cap-
 
 518 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 tain could write the best smashing article in England. 
 He wanted the opposition house of Bacon smashed, and 
 it was his opinion that the Captain could do that busi- 
 
 ness. If the Captain had written a letter of Junius on 
 a sheet of paper, or copied a part of the Church Cate- 
 chism, Mr. Bungay would have been perfectly contented, 
 and have considered that the article was a smashing arti- 
 cle. And he pocketed the papers with the greatest 
 satisfaction: and he not only paid for the MS., as we
 
 PENDENNIS 519 
 
 have seen, but he called little Mary to him, and gave her 
 a penny as he went away. 
 
 The reading of the manuscript over, the party en- 
 gaged in general conversation, Shandon leading with 
 a jaunty fashionable air in compliment to the two guests 
 who sate with him, and who, by their appearance and 
 manner, he presumed to be persons of the beau monde. 
 He knew very little indeed of the great world, but he 
 had seen it, and made the most of what he had seen. He 
 spoke of the characters of the day, and great personages 
 of the fashion, with easy familiarity find jocular allu- 
 sions, as if it was his habit to live amongst them. He 
 told anecdotes of their private life, and of conversations 
 he had had, and entertainments at which he had been 
 present, and at which such and such a thing occurred. 
 Pen was amused to hear the shabby prisoner in a tat- 
 tered dressing-gown talking glibly about the great of 
 the land. Mrs. Shandon was always delighted when 
 her husband told these tales, and believed in them fondly 
 every one. She did not want to mingle in the fashionable 
 world herself, she was not clever enough ; but the great 
 Society was the very place for her Charles : he shone in 
 it: he was respected in it. Indeed, Shandon had once 
 been asked to dinner by the Earl of X; his wife trea- 
 sured the invitation-card in her work-box at that very 
 day. 
 
 Mr. Bungay presently had enough of this talk and 
 got up to take leave, whereupon Warrington and Pen 
 rose to depart with the publisher, though the latter 
 would have liked to stay to make a further acquaintance 
 with this family, who interested him and touched him. 
 He said something about hoping for permission to re- 
 peat his visit, upon which Shandon, with a rueful grin,
 
 520 PENDENNIS 
 
 said he was always to be found at home, and should be 
 delighted to see Mr. Pennington. 
 
 "I'll see you to my park-gate, gentlemen," said Cap- 
 tain Shandon, seizing his hat, in spite of a deprecatory 
 look, and a faint cry of " Charles " from Mrs. Shandon. 
 And the Captain, in shabby slippers, shuffled out before 
 his guests, leading the way through the dismal passages 
 of the prison. His hand was already fiddling with his 
 waistcoat pocket, where Bungay's five-pound note was, 
 as he took leave of the three gentlemen at the wicket; 
 one of them, Mr. Arthur Pendennis, being greatly re- 
 lieved when he was out of the horrid place, and again 
 freely treading the flags of Farringdon-street. 
 
 Mrs. Shandon sadly went on with her work at the 
 window looking into the court. She saw Shandon with 
 a couple of men at his heels run rapidly in the direction 
 of the prison tavern. She had hoped to have had him to 
 dinner herself that day: there was a piece of meat, and 
 some salad in a basin, on the ledge outside of the win- 
 dow of their room, which she had expected that she and 
 little Mary were to share with the child's father. But 
 there was no chance of that now. He would be in that 
 tavern until the hours for closing it ; then he would go 
 and play at cards or drink in some other man's room, 
 and come back silent, with glazed eyes, reeling a little 
 in his walk, that his wife might nurse him. Oh, what 
 varieties of pain do we not make our women suffer 1 
 
 So Mrs. Shandon went to the cupboard, and, in lieu 
 of a dinner, made herself some tea. And in those vari- 
 eties of pain of which we spoke anon, what a part of 
 confidante has that poor tea-pot played ever since the 
 kindly plant was introduced among us! What myriads 
 of women have cried over it, to be sure ! What sick beds
 
 PENDENNIS 521 
 
 it has smoked by! What fevered lips have received re- 
 freshment from out of it! Nature meant very gently 
 by women when she made that tea-plant. With a little 
 thought what a series of pictures and groups the fancy 
 may conjure up and assemble round the tea-pot and 
 cup. Melissa and Saccharissa are talking love secrets 
 over it. Poor Polly has it and her lover's letters upon 
 the table; his letters who was her lover yesterday, and 
 when it was with pleasure, not despair, she wept over 
 them. Mary comes tripping noiselessly into her mother's 
 bed-room, bearing a cup of the consoler to the widow 
 who will take no other food. Ruth is busy concocting 
 it for her husband, who is coming home from the harvest 
 field one could fill a page with hints for such pictures; 
 finally, Mrs. Shandon and little Mary sit down and 
 drink their tea together, while the Captain goes out 
 and takes his pleasure. She cares for nothing else but 
 that, when her husband is away. 
 
 A gentleman with whom we are already slightly ac- 
 quainted, Mr. Jack Finucane, a townsman of Captain 
 Shandon's, found the Captain's wife and little Mary 
 (for whom Jack always brought a sweetmeat in his 
 pocket) over this meal. Jack thought Shandon the 
 greatest of created geniuses, had had one or two helps 
 from the good-natured prodigal, who had always a kind 
 word, and sometimes a guinea for any friend in need; 
 and never missed a day in seeing his patron. He was 
 ready to run Shandon's errands and transact his money- 
 business with publishers and newspaper editors, duns, 
 creditors, holders of Shandon's acceptances, gentlemen 
 disposed to speculate in those securities, and to transact 
 the thousand little affairs of an embarrassed Irish gen- 
 tleman. I never knew an embarrassed Irish gentleman
 
 522 PENDENNIS 
 
 yet, but he had an aide-de-camp of his own nation, like- 
 wise in circumstances of pecuniary discomfort. That 
 aide-de-camp has subordinates of his own, who again 
 may have other insolvent dependents all through his 
 life our Captain marched at the head of a ragged staff, 
 who shared in the rough fortunes of their chieftain. 
 
 " He won't have that five-pound note very long, I bet 
 a guinea," Mr. Bungay said of the Captain, as he and 
 his two companions walked away from the prison; and 
 the publisher judged rightly, for when Mrs. Shandon 
 came to empty her husband's pockets, she found but a 
 couple of shillings, and a few half -pence out of the 
 morning's remittance. Shandon had given a pound to 
 one follower ; had sent a leg of mutton and potatoes and 
 beer to an acquaintance in the poor side of the prison; 
 had paid an outstanding bill at the tavern where he had 
 changed his five-pound note; had had a dinner with 
 two friends there, to whom he lost sundry half-crowns 
 at cards afterwards; so that the night left him as poor 
 as the morning had found him. 
 
 The publisher and the two gentlemen had had some 
 talk together after quitting Shandon, and Warring- 
 ton reiterated to Bungay what he had said to his rival, 
 Bacon, viz., that Pen was a high fellow, of great genius, 
 and what was more, well with the great world, and re- 
 lated to " no end " of the peerage. Bungay replied that 
 he should be happy to have dealings with Mr. Penden- 
 nis, and hoped to have the pleasure of seeing both gents 
 to cut mutton with him before long, and so, with mutual 
 politeness and protestations, they parted. 
 
 ' It is hard to see such a man as Shandon," Pen said, 
 musing, and talking that night over the sight which he
 
 PENDENNIS 523 
 
 had witnessed, " of accomplishments so multifarious, 
 and of such an undoubted talent and humour, an inmate 
 of a gaol for half his time, and a bookseller's hanger-on 
 when out of prison." 
 
 " I am a bookseller's hanger-on you are going to try 
 your paces as a hack," Warrington said with a laugh. 
 " We are all hacks upon some road or other. I would 
 rather be myself, than Paley our neighbour in chambers : 
 who has as much enjoyment of his life as a mole. A 
 deuced deal of undeserved compassion has been thrown 
 away upon what you call your bookseller's drudge." 
 
 " Much solitary pipes and ale make a cynic of you," 
 Pen said. ' You are a Diogenes by a beer-barrel, War- 
 rington. No man shall tell me that a man of genius, as 
 Shandon is, ought to be driven by such a vulgar slave- 
 driver as yonder Mr. Bungay, whom we have just left, 
 who fattens on the profits of the other's brains, and en- 
 riches himself out of his journeyman's labour. It makes 
 me indignant to see a gentleman the serf of such a crea- 
 ture as that, of a man who can't speak the language that 
 he lives by, who is not fit to black Shandon's boots." 
 
 " So you have begun already to gird at the publishers, 
 and to take your side amongst our order. Bravo, Pen, 
 my boy! " Warrington answered, laughing still. " What 
 have you got to say against Bungay's relations with 
 Shandon? Was it the publisher, think you, who sent 
 the author to prison? Is it Bungay who is tippling away 
 the five-pound note which we saw just now, or Shan- 
 don?" 
 
 ;< Misfortune drives a man into bad company," Pen 
 said. ' It is easy to cry * Fie ! ' against a poor fellow who 
 has no society but such as he finds in a prison; and no 
 resource except f orgetfulness and the bottle. We must
 
 524 PENDENNIS 
 
 deal kindly with the eccentricities of genius, and remem- 
 ber that the very ardour and enthusiasm of tempera- 
 ment which makes the author delightful often leads the 
 man astray ! " 
 
 "A fiddlestick about men of genius!" Warrington 
 cried out, who was a very severe moralist upon some 
 points, though possibly a very bad practitioner. " I 
 deny that there are so many geniuses as people who 
 whimper about the fate of men of letters assert there 
 are. There are thousands of clever fellows in the world 
 who could, if they would, turn verses, write articles, read 
 books, and deliver a judgment upon them; the talk of 
 professional critics and writers is not a whit more bril- 
 liant, or profound, or amusing, than that of any other 
 society of educated people. If a lawyer, or a soldier, or 
 a parson, outruns his income, and does not pay his bills, 
 he must go to gaol; and an author must go, too. If 
 an author fuddles himself, I don't know why he should 
 be let off a headache the next morning, if he orders 
 a coat from the tailor's, why he shouldn't pay for it? " 
 
 " I would give him more money to buy coats," said 
 Pen, smiling. " I suppose I should like to belong to 
 a well-dressed profession. I protest against that wretch 
 of a middle-man whom I see between Genius and his 
 great landlord, the Public, and who stops more than 
 half of the labourer's earnings and fame." 
 
 "I am a prose labourer," Warrington said: "you, 
 my boy, are a poet in a small way, and so, I suppose, 
 consider you are authorised to be flighty. What is it 
 you want? Do you want a body of capitalists that shall 
 be forced to purchase the works of all authors, who may 
 present themselves, manuscript in hand? Everybody 
 who writes his epic, every driveller who can or can't
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 spell, and produces his novel or his tragedy, are they 
 all to come and find a bag of sovereigns in exchange 
 for their worthless reams of paper? Who is to settle 
 what is good or bad, salable or otherwise? Will you 
 give the buyer leave, in fine, to purchase or not? Why, 
 sir, when Johnson sate behind the screen at Saint John's 
 Gate, and took his dinner apart, because he was too 
 shabby and poor to join the literary bigwigs who were 
 regaling themselves round Mr. Cave's best table-cloth, 
 the tradesman was doing him no wrong. You couldn't 
 force the publisher to recognise the man of genius in the 
 young man who presented himself before him, ragged, 
 gaunt, and hungry. Rags are not a proof of genius; 
 whereas capital is absolute, as times go, and is perforce 
 the bargain-master. It has a right to deal with the lit- 
 erary inventor as with any other; if I produce a novelty 
 in the book trade, I must do the best I can with it ; but 
 I can no more force Mr. Murray to purchase my book 
 of travels or sermons, than I can compel Mr. Tattersall 
 to give me a hundred guineas for my horse. I may have 
 my own ideas of the value of my Pegasus, and think him 
 the most wonderful of animals; but the dealer has a 
 right to his opinion, too, and may want a lady's horse, 
 or a cob for a heavy timid rider, or a sound hack for the 
 road, and my beast won't suit him." 
 
 1 You deal in metaphors, Warrington," Pen said ; 
 " but you rightly say that you are very prosaic. Poor 
 Shandon! There is something about the kindness of 
 that man, and the gentleness of that sweet creature of 
 a wife, which touches me profoundly. I like him, I am 
 afraid, better than a better man." 
 
 " And so do I," Warrington said. " Let us give him 
 the benefit of our sympathy, and the pity that is due
 
 526 PENDENNIS 
 
 to his weakness: though I fear that sort of kindness 
 would be resented as contempt by a more high-minded 
 man. You see he takes his consolation along with his 
 misfortune, and one generates the other or balances it, 
 as is the way of the world. He is a prisoner, but he is 
 not unhappy." 
 
 " His genius sings within his prison bars," Pen said. 
 
 ' Yes," Warrington said, bitterly; " Shandon accom- 
 modates himself to a cage pretty well. He ought to be 
 wretched, but he has Jack and Tom to drink with, and 
 that consoles him: he might have a high place, but, as 
 he can't, why he can drink with Tom and Jack; he 
 might be providing for his wife and children, but 
 Thomas and John have got a bottle of brandy which 
 they want him to taste; he might pay poor Snip, the 
 tailor, the twenty pounds which the poor devil wants for 
 his landlord, but John and Thomas lay their hands upon 
 his purse; and so he drinks whilst his tradesman goes 
 to gaol and his family to ruin. Let us pity the misfor- 
 tunes of genius, and conspire against the publishing 
 tyrants who oppress men of letters." 
 
 'What! are you going to have another glass of 
 brandy-and-water? " Pen said, with a humorous look. 
 It was at the Back Kitchen that the above philosophical 
 conversation took place between the two young men. 
 
 Warrington began to laugh as usual. " Video meliora 
 proboqueI mean, bring it me hot, with sugar, John," 
 he said to the waiter. 
 
 ' I would have some more, too, only I don't want it," 
 said Pen. ' It does not seem to me, Warrington, that 
 we are much better than our neighbours." And War- 
 rington's last glass having been dispatched, the pair 
 returned to their chambers.
 
 PENDENNIS 527 
 
 They found a couple of notes in the letter-box, on 
 their return, which had been sent by their acquaintance 
 of the morning, Mr. Bungay. That hospitable gentle- 
 man presented his compliments to each of the gentle- 
 men, and requested the pleasure of their company at 
 dinner on an early day, to meet a few literary friends. 
 
 '* We shall have a grand spread," said Warrington. 
 ' We shall meet all Bungay's corps." 
 
 " All except poor Shandon," said Pen, nodding a 
 good night to his friend, and he went into his own little 
 room. The events and acquaintances of the day had 
 excited him a good deal, and he lay for some time awake 
 thinking over them, as Warrington's vigorous and regu- 
 lar snore from the neighbouring apartment pronounced 
 that that gentleman was engaged in deep slumber. 
 
 Is it true, thought Pendennis, lying on his bed and 
 gazing at a bright moon without, that lighted up a 
 corner of his dressing-table, and the frame of a little 
 sketch of Fairoaks drawn by Laura, that hung over his 
 drawers is it true that I am going to earn my bread 
 at last, and with my pen? that I shall impoverish the 
 dear mother no longer; and that I may gain a name 
 and reputation in the world, perhaps? These are wel- 
 come if they come, thought the young visionary, laugh- 
 ing and blushing to himself, though alone and in the 
 night, as he thought how dearly he would relish honour 
 and fame if they could be his. If fortune favours me, 
 I laud her ; if she frowns, I resign her. I pray Heaven 
 I may be honest if I fail, or if I succeed. I pray Heaven 
 I may tell the truth as far as I know it : that I mayn't 
 swerve from it through flattery, or interest, or personal 
 enmity, or party prejudice. Dearest old mother, what
 
 528 PENDENNIS 
 
 a pride will you have, if I can do anything worthy of 
 our name! and you, Laura, you won't scorn me as the 
 worthless idler and spendthrift, when you see that I 
 when I have achieved a psha! what an Alnaschar I 
 am because I have made five pounds by my poems, and 
 am engaged to write half a dozen articles for a news- 
 paper. He went on with these musings, more happy 
 and hopeful, and in a humbler frame of mind, than he 
 had felt to be for many a day. He thought over the 
 errors and idleness, the passions, extravagances, disap- 
 pointments, of his wayward youth : he got up from the 
 bed: threw open the window, and looked out into the 
 night: and then, by some impulse, which we hope was 
 a good one, he went up and kissed the picture of Fair- 
 oaks, and flinging himself down on his knees by the bed, 
 remained for some time in that posture of hope and 
 submission. When he rose, it was with streaming eyes. 
 He had found himself repeating, mechanically, some 
 little words which he had been accustomed to repeat as 
 a child at his mother's side, after the saying of which 
 she would softly take him to his bed and close the 
 curtains round him, hushing him with a benediction. 
 
 The next day, Mr. Pidgeon, their attendant, brought 
 in a large brown paper parcel, directed to G. Warring- 
 ton, Esq., with Mr. Trotter's compliments, and a note 
 which Warrington read. 
 
 " Pen, you beggar! " roared Warrington to Pen, who 
 was in his own room. 
 
 " Hullo! " sung out Pen. 
 
 " Come here, you're wanted," cried the other, and 
 Pen came out. ' What is it? " said he. 
 
 " Catch! " cried Warrington, and flung the parcel at
 
 PENDENNIS 529 
 
 Pen's head, who would have been knocked down had 
 he not caught it. 
 
 " It's books for review for the ' Pall Mall Gazette;' 
 pitch into 'em," Warrington said. As for Pen, he never 
 had been so delighted in his life: his hand trembled as 
 he cut the string of the packet, and beheld within a 
 smart set of new neat calico-bound books, travels, and 
 novels, and poems. 
 
 " Sport the oak, Pidgeon," said he. " I'm not at 
 home to anybody to-day." And he flung into his easy 
 chair, and hardly gave himself time to drink his tea, so 
 eager was he to begin to read and to review.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII 
 
 IN WHICH THE HISTORY STILL HOVERS ABOUT 
 FLEET-STREET 
 
 (ATTAIN SHANDON, urged on by his 
 wife, who seldom meddled in busi- 
 ness matters, had stipulated that 
 John Finucane, Esquire, of the Up- 
 per Temple, should be appointed sub- 
 editor of the forthcoming " Pall 
 Mall Gazette," and this post was accordingly conferred 
 upon Mr. Finucane by the spirited proprietor of the 
 Journal. Indeed he deserved any kindness at the hands 
 of Shandon, so fondly attached was he, as we have said, 
 to the Captain and his family, and so eager to do him a 
 service. It was in Finucane's chambers that Shandon 
 used in former days to hide when danger was near and 
 bailiffs abroad: until at length his hiding-place was 
 known, and the sheriff's officers came as regularly to 
 wait for the Captain on Finucane's stair-case as at his 
 own door. It was to Finucane's chambers that poor Mrs. 
 Shandon came often and often to explain her troubles 
 and griefs, and devise means of rescue for her adored 
 Captain. Many a meal did Finucane furnish for her 
 and the child there. It was an honour to his little rooms 
 to be visited by such a lady; and as she went down the 
 stair-case with her veil over her face, Fin would lean 
 over the balustrade looking after her, to see that no 
 Temple Lovelace assailed her upon the road, perhaps 
 
 530
 
 PENDENNIS 531 
 
 hoping that some rogue might be induced to waylay 
 her, so that he, Fin, might have the pleasure of rushing 
 to her rescue, and breaking the rascal's bones. It was a 
 sincere pleasure to Mrs. Shandon when the arrange- 
 ments were made by which her kind honest champion 
 was appointed her husband's aide-de-camp in the news- 
 paper. 
 
 He would have sate with Mrs. Shandon as late as the 
 prison hours permitted, and had indeed many a time 
 witnessed the putting to bed of little Mary, who occupied 
 a crib in the room; and to whose evening prayers that 
 God might bless papa, Finucane, although of the Ro- 
 mish faith himself, had said Amen with a great deal of 
 sympathy but he had an appointment with Mr. Bun- 
 gay regarding the affairs of the paper which they were 
 to discuss over a quiet dinner. So he went away at six 
 o'clock from Mrs. Shandon, but made his accustomed 
 appearance at the Fleet Prison next morning, having 
 arrayed himself in his best clothes and ornaments, which, 
 though cheap as to cost, were very brilliant as to colour 
 and appearance, and having in his pocket four pounds 
 two shillings, being the amount of his week's salary at 
 the " Daily Journal," minus two shillings expended by 
 him in the purchase of a pair of gloves on his way to 
 the prison. 
 
 He had cut his mutton with Mr. Bungay, as the latter 
 gentleman phrased it, and Mr. Trotter, Bungay's reader 
 and literary man of business, at Dick's CofFee-House on 
 the previous day, and entered at large into his views 
 respecting the conduct of the " Pall Mall Gazette." In 
 a masterly manner he had pointed out what should be 
 the sub-editorial arrangements of the paper: what 
 should be the type for the various articles: who should
 
 532 PENDENNIS 
 
 report the markets; who the turf and ring; who the 
 Church intelligence; and who the fashionable chit-chat. 
 He was acquainted with gentlemen engaged in culti- 
 vating these various departments of knowledge, and 
 in communicating them afterwards to the public in 
 fine, Jack Finucane was, as Shandon had said of him, 
 and, as he proudly owned himself to be, one of the best 
 sub-editors of a paper in London. He knew the weekly 
 earnings of every man connected with the Press, and 
 was up to a thousand dodges, or ingenious economic con- 
 trivances, by which money could be saved to spirited 
 capitalists, who were going to set up a paper. He at 
 once dazzled and mystified Mr. Bungay, who was slow 
 of comprehension, by the rapidity of the calculations 
 which he exhibited on paper, as they sate in the box. 
 And Bungay afterwards owned to his subordinate Mr. 
 Trotter, that that Irishman seemed a clever fellow. 
 
 And now having succeeded in making this impression 
 upon Mr. Bungay, the faithful fellow worked round to 
 the point which he had very near at heart, viz., the lib- 
 eration from prison of his admired friend and chief, 
 Captain Shandon. He knew to a shilling the amount 
 of the detainers which were against the Captain at the 
 porter's lodge of the Fleet; and, indeed, professed to 
 know all his debts, though this was impossible, for no 
 man in England, certainly not the Captain himself, was 
 acquainted with them. He pointed out what Shandon's 
 engagements already were; and how much better he 
 would work if removed from confinement (though this 
 Mr. Bungay denied, for, " when the Captain's locked 
 up," he said, " we are sure to find him at home; whereas, 
 when he's free, you can never catch hold of him ") ; 
 finally, he so worked on Mr. Bungay's feelings, by de-
 
 PENDENNIS 533 
 
 scribing Mrs. Shandon pining away in the prison, and 
 the child sickening there, that the publisher was induced 
 to promise that, if Mrs. Shandon would come to him 
 in the morning, he would see what could be done. And 
 the colloquy ending at this time with the second round 
 of brandy and water, although Finucane, who had four 
 guineas in his pocket, would have discharged the tavern 
 reckoning with delight, Bungay said, " No, sir, this is 
 my affair, sir, if you please. James, take the bill, and 
 eighteenpence for yourself," and he handed over the 
 necessary funds to the waiter. Thus it was that Finu- 
 cane, who went to bed at the Temple after the dinner 
 at Dick's, found himself actually with his week's salary 
 intact upon Saturday morning. 
 
 He gave Mrs. Shandon a wink so knowing and joyful, 
 that that kind creature knew some good news was in 
 store for her, and hastened to get her bonnet and shawl, 
 when Fin asked if he might have the honour of taking 
 her a walk, and giving her a little fresh air. And little 
 Mary jumped for joy at the idea of this holiday, for 
 Finucane never neglected to give her a toy, or to take 
 her to a show, and brought newspaper orders in his 
 pocket for all sorts of London diversions to amuse the 
 child. Indeed, he loved them with all his heart, and 
 would cheerfully have dashed out his rambling brains to 
 do them, or his adored Captain, a service. 
 
 " May I go, Charley? or shall I stay with you, for 
 you're poorly, dear, this morning? He's got a headache, 
 Mr. Finucane. He suffers from headaches, and I per- 
 suaded him to stay in bed," Mrs. Shandon said. 
 
 " Go along with you, and Polly. Jack, take care of 
 'em. Hand me over the Burton's Anatomy, and leave 
 me to my abominable devices," Shandon said, with per-
 
 534 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 feet good humour. He was writing, and not uncom- 
 monly took his Greek and Latin quotations (of which 
 he knew the use as a public writer) from that wonderful 
 repertory of learning. 
 
 So Fin gave his arm to Mrs. Shandon, and Mary went 
 skipping down the passages of the prison, and through 
 the gate into the free air. From Fleet Street to Pater- 
 noster Row is not very far. As the three reached Mr. 
 Bungay's shop, Mrs. Bungay was also entering at the
 
 PENDENNIS 535 
 
 private door, holding in her hand a paper parcel and a 
 manuscript volume bound in red, and, indeed, contain- 
 ing an account of her transactions with the butcher in 
 the neighbouring market. Mrs. Bungay was in a gor- 
 geous shot silk dress, which flamed with red and purple ; 
 she wore a yellow shawl, and had red flowers inside her 
 bonnet, and a brilliant light blue parasol. Mrs. Shan- 
 don was in an old black watered silk; her bonnet had 
 never seen very brilliant days of prosperity any more 
 than its owner, but she could not help looking like a 
 lady whatever her attire was. The two women curtsied 
 to each other, each according to her fashion. 
 
 " I hope you're pretty well, Mum? " said Mrs. Bun- 
 gay- 
 
 " It's a very fine day," said Mrs. Shandon. 
 
 ' Won't you step in, Mum? " said Mrs. Bungay, look- 
 ing so hard at the child as almost to frighten her. 
 
 "I I came about business with Mr. Bungay I I 
 hope he's pretty well? " said timid Mrs. Shandon. 
 
 " If you go to see him in the counting-house, couldn't 
 you couldn't you leave your little gurl with me? " said 
 Mrs. Bungay, in a deep voice, and with a tragic look, 
 as she held out one finger towards the child. 
 
 " I want to stay with mamma," cried little Mary, 
 burying her face in her mother's dress. 
 
 " Go with this lady, Mary, my dear," said the mother. 
 
 " I'll show you some pretty pictures," said Mrs. Bun- 
 gay, with the voice of an ogress, " and some nice things 
 besides; look here" and opening her brown paper 
 parcel, Mrs. Bungay displayed some choice sweet bis- 
 cuits, such as her Bungay loved after his wine. Little. 
 Mary followed after this attraction, the whole party 
 entering at the private entrance, from which a side door
 
 536 PENDENNIS 
 
 led into Mr. Bungay's commercial apartments. Here, 
 however, as the child was about to part from her mother, 
 her courage again failed her, and again she ran to the 
 maternal petticoat; upon which the kind and gentle 
 Mrs. Shandon, seeing the look of disappointment in 
 Mrs. Bungay's face, good-naturedly said, " If you will 
 let me, I will come up too, and sit for a few minutes," 
 and so the three females ascended the stairs together. 
 A second biscuit charmed little Mary into perfect con- 
 fidence, and in a minute or two she prattled away with- 
 out the least restraint. 
 
 Faithful Finucane meanwhile found Mr. Bungay in 
 a severer mood than he had been on the night previous, 
 when two-thirds of a bottle of port, and two large glasses 
 of brandy and water, had warmed his soul into enthu- 
 siasm, and made him generous in his promises towards 
 Captain Shandon. His impetuous wife had rebuked 
 him on his return home. She had ordered that he 
 should give no relief to the Captain ; he was a good-for- 
 nothing fellow, whom no money would help; she dis- 
 approved of the plan of the " Pall Mall Gazette," and 
 expected that Bungay would only lose his money in it 
 as they were losing over the way (she always called 
 her brother's establishment "over the way,") by the 
 " Whitehall Journal." Let Shandon stop in prison and 
 do his work ; it was the best place for him. In vain Fin- 
 ucane pleaded and promised and implored, for his friend 
 Bungay had had an hour's lecture in the morning and 
 was inexorable. 
 
 But what honest Jack failed to do below stairs in 
 Jhe counting-house, the pretty faces and manners of 
 the mother and child were effecting in the drawing- 
 room, where they were melting the fierce but really soft
 
 Mrs. Bungay mollified
 
 PENDENXIS 537 
 
 Mrs. Bungay. There was an artless sweetness in Mrs. 
 Shandon's voice, and a winning frankness of manner, 
 which made most people fond of her, and pity her : and 
 taking courage by the rugged kindness with which her 
 hostess received her, the Captain's lady told her story, 
 and described her husband's goodness and virtues, and 
 her child's failing health (she was obliged to part with 
 two of them, she said, and send them to school, for she 
 could not have them in that horrid place) that Mrs. 
 Bungay, though as grim as Lady Macbeth, melted under 
 the influence of the simple tale, and said she would go 
 down and speak to Bungay. Now in this household to 
 speak was to command, with Mrs. Bungay; and with 
 Bungay, to hear was to obey. 
 
 It was just when poor Finucane was in despair about 
 his negotiation, that the majestic Mrs. Bungay de- 
 scended upon her spouse, politely requested Mr. Finu- 
 cane to step up to his friends in her drawing-room, while 
 she held a few minutes' conversation with Mr. B., and 
 when the pair were alone the publisher's better half in- 
 formed him of her intentions towards the Captain's 
 lady. 
 
 ' What's in the wind now, my dear? " Maecenas asked, 
 surprised at his wife's altered tone. ' You wouldn't 
 hear of my doing anything for the Captain this morn- 
 ing: I wonder what has been a changing of you." 
 
 * The Capting is an Irishman," Mrs. Bungay replied ; 
 "and those Irish I have always said I couldn't abide. But 
 his wife is a lady, as any one can see ; and a good woman, 
 and a clergyman's daughter, and a West of England 
 woman, B., which I am myself, by my mother's side 
 and, O Marmaduke, didn't you remark her little gurl? " 
 
 " Yes, Mrs. B., I saw the little girl."
 
 538 PENDENNIS 
 
 " And didn't you see how like she was to our angel, 
 Bessy, Mr. B.?" and Mrs. Bungay's thoughts flew 
 back to a period eighteen years back, when Bacon and 
 Bungay had just set up in business as small booksellers 
 in a country town, and when she had had a child, named 
 Bessy, something like the little Mary who had just moved 
 her compassion. 
 
 ' Well, well, my dear," Mr. Bungay said, seeing the 
 little eyes of his wife begin to twinkle and grow red; 
 " the Captain ain't in for much. There's only a hundred 
 and thirty pound against him. Half the money will 
 take him out of the Fleet, Finucane says, and we'll pay 
 him half salaries till he has made the account square. 
 When the little 'un said, * Why don't you take Par out 
 of piz'n? ' I did feel it, Flora, upon my honour I did, 
 now." And the upshot of this conversation was, that 
 Mr. and Mrs. Bungay both ascended to the drawing- 
 room, and Mr. Bungay made a heavy and clumsy speech, 
 in which he announced to Mrs. Shandon, that, hearing 
 sixty-five pounds would set her husband free, he was 
 ready to advance that sum of money, deducting it from 
 the Captain's salary, and that he would give it to her 
 on condition that she would personally settle with the 
 creditors regarding her husband's liberation. 
 
 I think this was the happiest day that Mrs. Shandon 
 and Mr. Finucane had had for a long time. " Bedad, 
 Bungay, you're a trump ! " roared out Fin, in an over- 
 powering brogue and emotion. " Give us your fist, old 
 boy : and won't we send the ' Pall Mall Gazette ' up to 
 ten thousand a-week, that's all! " and he jumped about 
 the room, and tossed up little Mary, with a hundred 
 frantic antics. 
 
 " If I could drive you anywhere in my carriage, Mrs.
 
 PENDENNIS 539 
 
 Shandon I'm sure it's quite at your service," Mrs. Bun- 
 gay said, looking out at a one-horsed vehicle which had 
 just driven up, and in which this lady took the air con- 
 siderably and the two ladies, with little Mary between 
 them (whose tiny hand Maecenas's wife kept fixed in her 
 great grasp ) , with the delighted Mr. Finucane on the 
 back seat, drove away from Paternoster Row, as the 
 owner of the vehicle threw triumphant glances at the 
 opposite windows at Bacon's. 
 
 " It won't do the Captain any goody thought Bun- 
 gay, going back to his desk and accounts, " but Mrs. 
 B. becomes reg'lar upset when she thinks about her mis- 
 fortune. The child would have been of age yesterday, 
 if she'd lived. Bessy told me so : " and he wondered how 
 women did remember things. 
 
 We are happy to say that Mrs. Shandon sped with 
 very good success upon her errand. She who had had to 
 mollify creditors when she had no money at all, and only 
 tears and entreaties wherewith to socrthe them, found no 
 difficulty in making them relent by means of a bribe of 
 ten shillings in the pound ; and the next Sunday was the 
 last, for some time at least, which the Captain spent in 
 prison.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV 
 
 A DINNER IN THE ROW 
 
 PON the appointed day our 
 two friends made their ap- 
 pearance at Mr. Bungay's 
 door in Paternoster Row ; not 
 the public entrance through 
 which booksellers' boys is- 
 sued with their sacks full 
 of Bungay's volumes, and 
 around which timid aspirants 
 lingered with their virgin 
 manuscripts ready for sale 
 
 to Sultan Bungay, but at the private door of the house, 
 whence the splendid Mrs. Bungay would come forth to 
 step into her chaise and take her drive, settling herself 
 on the cushions, and casting looks of defiance at Mrs. 
 Bacon's opposite windows at Mrs. Bacon, who was as 
 yet a chaiseless woman. 
 
 On such occasions, when very much wroth at her sister- 
 in-law's splendour, Mrs. Bacon would fling up the sash 
 of her drawing-room window, and look out with her 
 four children at the chaise, as much as to say, " Look 
 at these four darlings, Flora Bungay! This is why I 
 can't drive in my carriage; you would give a coach and 
 four to have the same reason." And it was with these 
 arrows out of her quiver that Emma Bacon shot Flora 
 Bungay as she sate in her chariot envious and childless. 
 
 540
 
 PENDENNIS 541 
 
 As Pen and Warrington came to Bungay's door, a 
 carriage and a cab drove up to Bacon's. Old Dr. Slo- 
 cum descended heavily from the first; the Doctor's 
 equipage was as ponderous as his style, but both had a 
 fine sonorous effect upon the publishers in the Row. A 
 couple of dazzling white waistcoats stepped out of the 
 cab. 
 
 Warrington laughed. ' You see Bacon has his dinner 
 party too. That is Dr. Slocum, author of ' Memoirs of 
 the Poisoners.' You would hardly have recognised our 
 friend Hoolan in that gallant white waistcoat. Doolan 
 is one of Bungay's men, and, faith, here he comes. In- 
 deed Messrs. Hoolan and Doolan had come from the 
 Strand in the same cab, tossing up by the way which 
 should pay the shilling; and Mr. D. stepped from the 
 other side of the way, arrayed in black, with a large pair 
 of white gloves which were spread out on his hands, 
 and which the owner could not help regarding with 
 pleasure. 
 
 The house porter in an evening coat, and gentlemen 
 with gloves as large as Doolan's, but of the famous 
 Berlin web, were on the passage of Mr. Bungay's house 
 to receive the guests' hats and coats, and baw r l their names 
 up the stair. Some of the latter had arrived \vhen the 
 three new visitors made their appearance ; but there was 
 only Mrs. Bungay, in red satin and a turban, to repre- 
 sent her own charming sex. She made curtsies to each 
 new comer as he entered the drawing-room, but her mind 
 was evidently pre-occupied by extraneous thoughts. The 
 fact is, Mrs. Bacon's dinner party was disturbing her, 
 and as soon as she had received each individual of her 
 own company, Flora Bungay flew back to the embrasure 
 of the window, whence she could rake the carriages of
 
 542 PENDENNIS 
 
 Emma Bacon's friends as they came rattling up the 
 Row. The sight of Dr. Slocum's large carriage, with 
 the gaunt job-horses, crushed Flora: none but hack cabs 
 had driven up to her own door on that day. 
 
 They were all literary gentlemen, though unknown as 
 yet to Pen. There was Mr. Bole, the real editor of the 
 magazine of which Mr. Wagg was the nominal chief; 
 Mr. Trotter, who, from having broken out on the world 
 as a poet of a tragic and suicidal cast, had now subsided 
 into one of Mr. Bungay's back shops as reader for that 
 gentleman ; and Captain Sumph, an ex-beau still about 
 town, and related in some indistinct manner to Litera- 
 ture and the Peerage. He was said to have written a 
 book once, to have been a friend of Lord Byron, to be 
 related to Lord Sumphington; in fact, anecdotes of 
 Byron formed his staple, and he seldom spoke but with 
 the name of that poet or some of his contemporaries in 
 his mouth, as thus: " I remember poor Shelley at school 
 being sent up for good for a copy of verses, every line 
 of which I wrote, by Jove;" or, " I recollect, when I 
 was at Missolonghi with Byron, offering to bet Gamba," 
 and so forth. This gentleman, Pen remarked, was lis- 
 tened to with great attention by Mrs. Bungay ; his anec- 
 dotes of the aristocracy, of which he was a middle-aged 
 member, delighted the publisher's lady; and he was al- 
 most a greater man than the great Mr. Wagg himself 
 in her eyes. Had he but come in his own carriage, Mrs. 
 Bungay would have made her Bungay purchase any 
 given volume from his pen. 
 
 Mr. Bungay went about to his guests as they arrived, 
 and did the honours of his house with much cordiality. 
 " How are you, sir? Fine day, sir. Glad to see you 
 year, sir. Flora, my love, let me 'ave the honour of in-
 
 PENDENNIS 543 
 
 troducing Mr. Warrington to you. Mr. Warrington, 
 Mrs. Bungay; Mr. Pendennis, Mrs. Bungay. Hope 
 you've brought good appetites with you, gentlemen. 
 You, Doolan, I know 'ave, for you've always 'ad a deuce 
 of a twist." 
 
 " Lor', Bungay! " said Mrs. Bungay. 
 
 " Faith, a man must be hard to please, Bungay, who 
 can't eat a good dinner in this house," Doolan said, and 
 he winked and stroked his lean chops with his large 
 gloves ; and made appeals of friendship to Mrs. Bungay, 
 which that honest woman refused with scorn from the 
 timid man. " She couldn't abide that Doolan," she said 
 in confidence to her friends. Indeed, all his flatteries 
 failed to win her. 
 
 As they talked, Mrs. Bungay surveying mankind 
 from her window, a magnificent vision of an enormous 
 grey cab-horse appeared, and neared rapidly. A pair 
 of white reins, held by small white gloves, were visible 
 behind it; a face pale, but richly decorated with a chin- 
 tuft, the head of an exiguous groom bobbing over the 
 cab-head these bright things were revealed to the de- 
 lighted Mrs. Bungay. ' The Honourable Percy Pop- 
 joy's quite punctual, I declare," she said, and sailed to 
 the door to be in waiting at the nobleman's arrival. 
 
 " It's Percy Popjoy," said Pen, looking out of win- 
 dow, and seeing an individual, in extremely lacquered 
 boots, descend from the swinging cab: and, in fact, it 
 was that young nobleman Lord Falconet's eldest son, 
 as we all very well know, who was come to dine with the 
 publisher his publisher of the Row. 
 
 " He was my fag at Eton," Warrington said. " I 
 ought to have licked him a little more." He and Pen had 
 had some bouts at the Oxbridge Union debates, in which
 
 544 PENDENNIS 
 
 Pen had had very much the better of Percy : who pres- 
 ently appeared, with his hat under his arm, and a look 
 of indescribable good humour and fatuity in his round 
 dimpled face, upon which Nature had burst out with 
 a chin-tuft, but, exhausted with the effort, had left the 
 rest of the countenance bare of hair. 
 
 The temporary groom of the chambers bawled out, 
 " The Honourable Percy Popjoy," much to that gentle- 
 man's discomposure at hearing his titles announced. 
 
 ' What did the man want to take away my hat for, 
 Bungay? " he asked of the publisher. " Can't do with- 
 out my hat want it to make my bow to Mrs. Bungay. 
 How well you look, Mrs. Bungay, to-day. Haven't 
 seen your carriage in the Park: why haven't you been 
 there? I missed you; indeed, I did." 
 
 " I'm afraid you're a sad quiz," said Mrs. Bungay. 
 
 "Quiz! Never made a joke in my hullo! who's 
 here? How d'ye do, Pendennis? How d'ye do, War- 
 rington? These are old friends of mine, Mrs. Bungay. 
 I say, how the doose did you come here? " he asked of the 
 two young men, turning his lacquered heels upon Mrs. 
 Bungay, who respected her husband's two young guests, 
 now that she found they were intimate with a lord's son. 
 
 'What! do they know him?" she asked rapidly of 
 Mr. B. 
 
 " High fellers, I tell you the young one related to 
 all the nobility," said the publisher; and both ran for- 
 ward, smiling and bowing, to greet almost as great per- 
 sonages as the young lord no less characters, indeed, 
 than the great Mr. Wenham and the great Mr. Wagg, 
 who were now announced. 
 
 Mr. Wenham entered, wearing the usual demure look 
 and stealthy smile with which he commonly surveyed the
 
 PENDENNIS 545 
 
 tips of his neat little shining boots, and which he but 
 seldom brought to bear upon the person who addressed 
 him. Wagg's white waistcoat spread out, on the con- 
 trary, with profuse brilliancy; his burly, red face shone 
 resplendent over it, lighted up with the thoughts of good 
 jokes and a good dinner. He liked to make his entree 
 into a drawing-room with a laugh, and, when he went 
 away at night, to leave a joke exploding behind him. 
 No personal calamities or distresses (of which that hu- 
 mourist had his share in common with the un jocular part 
 of mankind) could altogether keep his humour down. 
 Whatever his griefs might be, the thought of a dinner 
 rallied his great soul ; and when he saw a lord, he saluted 
 him with a pun. 
 
 Wenham went up, then, with a smug smile and whis- 
 per, to Mrs. Bungay, and looked at her from under his 
 eyes, and showed her the tips of his shoes. Wagg said 
 she looked charming, and pushed on straight at the 
 young nobleman, whom he called Pop; and to whom 
 he instantly related a funny story, seasoned with what 
 the French call gros sel. He was delighted to see Pen, 
 too, and shook hands with him, and slapped him on the 
 back cordially; for he was full of spirits and good 
 humour. And he talked in a loud voice about their last 
 place and occasion of meeting at Baymouth ; and asked 
 how their friends of Clavering Park were, and whether 
 Sir Francis was not coming to London for the season; 
 and whether Pen had been to see Lady Rockminster, who 
 had arrived fine old lady, Lady Rockminster! These 
 remarks Wagg made not for Pen's ear so much as for 
 the edification of the company, whom he was glad to 
 inform that he paid visits to gentlemen's country seats, 
 and was on intimate terms with the nobilitv.
 
 546 PENDENNIS 
 
 Wenham also shook hands with our young friend 
 all of which scenes Mrs. Bungay remarked with respect- 
 ful pleasure, and communicated her ideas to Bungay, 
 afterwards, regarding the importance of Mr. Pendennis 
 ideas by which Pen profited much more than he was 
 aware. 
 
 Pen, who had read, and rather admired some of her 
 works (and expected to find in Miss Bunion a person 
 somewhat resembling her own description of herself in 
 the " Passion-Flowers," in which she stated that her 
 youth resembled 
 
 "A violet, shrinking meanly 
 When blows the March wind keenly; 
 A timid fawn, on wild-wood lawn, 
 Where oak -boughs rustle greenly, 
 
 and that her maturer beauty was something very differ- 
 ent, certainly, to the artless loveliness of her prime, but 
 still exceedingly captivating and striking), beheld, 
 rather to his surprise and amusement, a large and bony 
 woman in a crumpled satin dress, who came creaking 
 into the room with a step as heavy as a grenadier's. 
 Wagg instantly noted the straw which she brought in 
 at the rumpled skirt of her dress, and would have stooped 
 to pick it up, but Miss Bunion disarmed all criticism by 
 observing this ornament herself, and, putting down her 
 own large foot upon it, so as to separate it from her 
 robe, she stooped and picked up the straw, saying to 
 Mrs. Bungay, that she was very sorry to be a little late, 
 but that the omnibus was very slow and what a comfort 
 it was to get a ride all the way from Brompton for six- 
 pence. Nobody laughed at the poetess's speech, it was 
 uttered so simply. Indeed, the worthy woman had not
 
 PENDENNIS 547 
 
 the least notion of being ashamed of an action incidental 
 upon her poverty. 
 
 " Is that ' Passion-Flowers? ' " Pen said to Wenham, 
 by whom he was standing. ' Why, her picture in the 
 volume represents her as a very well-looking young 
 woman." 
 
 ' You know passion-flowers, like all others, will run 
 to seed," Wenham said; "Miss Bunion's portrait was 
 probably painted some years ago." 
 
 ' Well, I like her for not being ashamed of her pov- 
 erty." 
 
 " So do I," said Mr. Wenham, who would have 
 starved rather than have come to dinner in an omnibus; 
 " but I don't think that she need flourish the straw about, 
 do you, Mr. Pendennis? My dear Miss Bunion, how do 
 you do? I was in a great lady's drawing-room this morn- 
 ing, and everybody was charmed with your new volume. 
 Those lines on the christening of Lady Fanny Fantail 
 brought tears into the Duchess's eyes. I said that I 
 thought I should have the pleasure of meeting you to- 
 day, and she begged me to thank you, and say how 
 greatly she was pleased." 
 
 This history, told in a bland, smiling manner, of a 
 Duchess whom Wenham had met that very morning, 
 too, quite put poor Wagg's dowager and baronet out 
 of court, and placed Wenham beyond Wagg as a man 
 of fashion. Wenham kept this inestimable advantage, 
 and having the conversation to himself, ran on with a 
 number of anecdotes regarding the aristocracy. He 
 tried to bring Mr. Popjoy into the conversation by mak- 
 ing appeals to him, and saying, " I was telling your 
 father this morning," or, " I think you were present at 
 W. house the other night when the Duke said so and so,"
 
 548 PENDENNIS 
 
 but Mr. Popjoy would not gratify him by joining in 
 the talk, preferring to fall back into the window recess 
 with Mrs. Bungay, and watch the cabs that drove up 
 to the opposite door. At least, if he would not talk, the 
 hostess hoped that those odious Bacons would see how 
 she had secured the noble Percy Popjoy for her party. 
 
 And now the bell of Saint Paul's tolled half an hour 
 later than that for which Mr. Bungay had invited his 
 party, and it was complete with the exception of two 
 guests, who at last made their appearance, and in whom 
 Pen was pleased to recognise Captain and Mrs. Shan- 
 don. 
 
 When these two had made their greetings to the mas- 
 ter and mistress of the house, and exchanged nods of 
 more or less recognition with most of the people present, 
 Pen and Warrington went up and shook hands very 
 warmly with Mrs. Shandon, who, perhaps, was affected 
 to meet them, and think where it was she had seen them 
 but a few days before. Shandon was brushed up, and 
 looked pretty smart, in a red velvet waistcoat, and a 
 frill, into which his wife had stuck her best brooch. In 
 spite of Mrs. Bungay's kindness, perhaps in consequence 
 of it, Mrs. Shandon felt great terror and timidity in ap- 
 proaching her: indeed, she was more awful than ever 
 in her red satin and bird of paradise, and it was not 
 until she had asked in her great voice about the dear 
 little gurl, that the latter was somewhat encouraged, 
 and ventured to speak. 
 
 " Nice-looking woman," Popjoy whispered to War- 
 rington. " Do introduce me to Captain Shandon, War- 
 rington. I'm told he's a tremendous clever fellow; and, 
 dammy, I adore intellect, by Jove I do! " This was the 
 truth: Heaven had not endowed young Mr. Popjoy
 
 PENDENNIS 549 
 
 with much intellect of his own, but had given him a gen- 
 erous faculty for admiring, if not for appreciating, the 
 intellect of others. " And introduce me to Miss Bunion. 
 I'm told she's very clever too. She's rum to look at, 
 certainly, but that don't matter. Dammy, I consider 
 myself a literary man, and I wish to know all the clever 
 fellows." So Mr. Popjoy and Mr. Shandon had the 
 pleasure of becoming acquainted with one another; and 
 now the doors of the adjoining dining-room being flung 
 open, the party entered and took their seats at table. 
 Pen found himself next to Miss Bunion on one side, 
 and to Mr. Wagg the truth is, Wagg fled alarmed 
 from the vacant place by the poetess, and Pen was com- 
 pelled to take it. 
 
 The gifted being did not talk much during dinner, but 
 Pen remarked that she ate, with a vast appetite, and 
 never refused any of the supplies of wine which were 
 offered to her by the butler. Indeed, Miss Bunion hav- 
 ing considered Mr. Pendennis for a minute, who gave 
 himself rather grand airs, and who was attired in an 
 extremely fashionable style, with his very best chains, 
 shirt studs, and cambric fronts, he was set down, and 
 not without reason, as a prig by the poetess; who 
 thought it was much better to attend to her dinner than 
 to take any notice of him. She told him as much in after 
 days with her usual candour. " I took you for one of 
 the little Mayfair dandies," she said to Pen. ' You 
 looked as solemn as a little undertaker; and as I dis- 
 liked, beyond measure, the odious creature who was on 
 the other side of me, I thought it was best to eat my 
 dinner and hold my tongue." 
 
 " And you did both very well, my dear Miss Bunion," 
 Pen said with a laugh.
 
 550 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Well, so I do, but I intend to talk to you the next 
 time a great deal: for you are neither so solemn, nor 
 so stupid, nor so pert as you look." 
 
 " Ah, Miss Bunion, how I pine for that ' next time ' 
 to come," Pen said, with an air of comical gallantry: 
 But we must return to the day, and the dinner at Pater- 
 noster Row. 
 
 The repast was of the richest description ' What I 
 call of the florid Gothic style," Wagg whispered to Pen, 
 who sate beside the humourist, in his side-wing voice. 
 The men in creaking shoes and Berlin gloves were nu- 
 merous and solemn, carrying on rapid conversations be- 
 hind the guests, as they moved to and fro with the dishes. 
 Doolan called out, " Waither," to one of them, and 
 blushed when he thought of his blunder. Mrs. Bungay's 
 own footboy was lost amidst those large and black- 
 coated attendants. 
 
 " Look at that very bow-windowed man," Wagg said. 
 " He's an undertaker in Amen Corner, and attends fu- 
 nerals and dinners. Cold meat and hot, don't you per- 
 ceive? He's the sham butler here, and I observe, my 
 dear Mr. Pendennis, as you will through life, that wher- 
 ever there is a sham butler at a London dinner there is 
 sham wine this sherry is filthy. Bungay, my boy, 
 where did you get this delicious brown sherry? " 
 
 ' I'm glad you like it, Mr. Wagg; glass with you," 
 said the publisher. :< It's some I got from Alderman 
 Benning's store, and gave a good figure for it, I can 
 tell you. Mr. Pendennis, will you join us? Your 'ealth, 
 gentlemen." 
 
 ' The old rogue, where does he expect to go to? It 
 came from the public-house," Wagg said. ' It requires 
 two men to carry off that sherry, 'tis so uncommonly
 
 PENDENNIS 551 
 
 strong. I wish I had a bottle of old Steyne's wine here, 
 Pendennis : your uncle and I have had many a one. He 
 sends it about to people where he is in the habit of din- 
 ing. I remember at poor Rawdon Crawley's, Sir Pitt 
 Crawley's brother he was Governor of Coventry Isl- 
 and Steyne's chef always came in the morning, and 
 the butler arrived with the champagne from Gaunt 
 House, in the ice-pails ready." 
 
 "Plow good this is!" said Popjoy, good-naturedly. 
 ' You must have a cordon bleu in your kitchen." 
 
 " O yes," Mrs. Bungay said, thinking he spoke of a 
 jack-chain very likely. 
 
 " I mean a French chef," said the polite guest. 
 
 " O yes, your lordship," again said the lady. 
 
 " Does your artist say he's a Frenchman, Mrs. B.? " 
 called out Wagg. 
 
 ' Well, I'm sure I don't know," answered the pub- 
 lisher's lady. 
 
 " Because, if he does, he's a quizzin' yer" cried Mr. 
 Wagg; but nobody saw the pun, which disconcerted 
 somewhat the bashful punster. * The dinner is from 
 Griggs' in St. Paul's Churchyard; so is Bacon's," he 
 whispered Pen. " Bungay writes to give half-a-crown 
 a head more than Bacon, so does Bacon. They would 
 poison each other's ices if they could get near them; 
 and as for the made-dishes they are poison. This 
 hum ha this Brimborion a la Sevigne is delicious, 
 Mrs. B.," he said, helping himself to a dish which the 
 undertaker handed to him. 
 
 ' Well, I'm glad you like it," Mrs. Bungay answered, 
 blushing, and not knowing whether the name of the dish 
 was actually that which Wagg gave to it, but dimly 
 conscious that that individual was quizzing her. Ac-
 
 552 PENDENNIS 
 
 cordingly she hated Mr. Wagg with female ardour; 
 and would have deposed him from his command over 
 Mr. Bungay's periodical, but that his name was great 
 in the trade, and his reputation in the land considerable. 
 
 By the displacement of persons, Warrington had 
 found himself on the right hand of Mrs. Shandon, who 
 sate in plain black silk and faded ornaments by the side 
 of the florid publisher. The sad smile of the lady moved 
 his rough heart to pity. Nobody seemed to interest him- 
 self about her: she sate looking at her husband, who 
 himself seemed rather abashed in the presence of some 
 of the company. Wenham and Wagg both knew him 
 and his circumstances. He had worked with the latter, 
 and was immeasurably his superior in wit, genius, and 
 acquirements; but Wagg's star was brilliant in the 
 world, and poor Shandon was unknown there. He could 
 not speak before the noisy talk of the coarser and more 
 successful man; but drank his wine in silence, and as 
 much of it as the people would give him. He was under 
 surveillance. Bungay had warned the undertaker not 
 to fill the Captain's glass too often or too full. It was 
 a melancholy precaution that, and the more melancholy 
 that it was necessary. Mrs. Shandon, too, cast alarmed 
 glances across the table to see that her husband did not 
 exceed. 
 
 Abashed by the failure of his first pun, for he was 
 impudent and easily disconcerted, Wagg kept his con- 
 versation pretty much to Pen during the rest of dinner, 
 and of course chiefly spoke about their neighbours. 
 ' This is one of Bungay's grand field-days," he said. 
 ' We are all Bungavians here. Did you read Pop joy's 
 novel? It was an old magazine story written by poor 
 Buzzard years ago, and forgotten here until Mr. Trot-
 
 PENDENNIS 553 
 
 ter (that is Trotter with the large shirt collar) fished it 
 out and bethought him that it was applicable to the late 
 elopement; so Bob wrote a few chapters a propos 
 Popjoy permitted the use of his name, and I dare say 
 supplied a page here and there and ' Desperation, or 
 the Fugitive Duchess' made its appearance. The great 
 fun is to examine Popjoy about his own work, of which 
 he doesn't know a word. I say, Popjoy, what a capital 
 passage that is in Volume Three, where the Cardinal 
 in disguise, after being converted by the Bishop of Lon- 
 don, proposes marriage to the Duchess's daughter." 
 
 "Glad you like it," Popjoy answered; "it's a fa- 
 vourite bit of my own." 
 
 ' There's no such thing in the whole book," whispered 
 Wagg to Pen. " Invented it myself . Gad! it wouldn't 
 be a bad plot for a high-church novel." 
 
 " I remember poor Byron, Hobhouse, Trelawney, and 
 myself, dining with Cardinal Mezzocaldo, at Rome," 
 Captain Sumph began, " and we had some Orvieto wine 
 for dinner, which Byron liked very much. And I re- 
 member how the Cardinal regretted that he was a single 
 man. We went to Civita Vecchia two days afterwards, 
 where Byron's yacht was and, by Jove, the Cardinal 
 died within three weeks ; and Byron was very sorry, for 
 he rather liked him." 
 
 " A devilish interesting story, Sumph, indeed," Wagg 
 said. 
 
 * You should publish some of those stories, Captain 
 Sumph, you really should. Such a volume would make 
 our friend Bungay's fortune," Shandon said. 
 
 ' Why don't you ask Sumph to publish 'em in your 
 new paper the what-d'ye-caU'em hay, Shandon?" 
 bawled out Wagg.
 
 554 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Why don't you ask him to publish 'em in your old 
 magazine, the Thingumbob? " Shandon replied. 
 
 " Is there going to be a new paper? " asked Wenham, 
 who knew perfectly well ; but was ashamed of his con- 
 nection with the press. 
 
 " Bungay going to bring out a paper? " cried Popjoy, 
 who, on the contrary, was proud of his literary reputa- 
 tion and acquaintances. * You must employ me. Mrs. 
 Bungay, use your influence with him, and make him 
 employ me. Prose or verse what shall it be? Novels, 
 poems, travels, or leading articles, begad. Anything 
 or everything only let Bungay pay me, and I'm ready 
 -I am now, my dear Mrs. Bungay, begad, now." 
 
 " It's to be called the ' Small Beer Chronicle,' " 
 growled Wagg, " and little Popjoy is to be engaged for 
 the infantine department." 
 
 " It is to be called the * Pall Mall Gazette,' sir, and 
 we shall be very happy to have you with us," Shandon 
 said. 
 
 " ' Pall Mall Gazette '-why ' Pall Mall Gazette? ' 
 asked Wagg. 
 
 " Because the editor was born at Dublin, the sub- 
 editor at Cork, because the proprietor lives in Paternos- 
 ter Row, and the paper is published in Catherine Street, 
 Strand. Won't that reason suffice you, Wagg? " Shan- 
 don said ; he was getting rather angry. " Everything 
 must have a name. My dog Ponto has got a name. 
 You've got a name, and a name which you deserve, more 
 or less, bedad. Why d'ye grudge the name to our 
 paper? " 
 
 " By any other name it would smell as sweet," said 
 Wagg. 
 
 " I'll have ye remember it's name's not whatdyecallem,
 
 PENDENNIS 555 
 
 Mr. Wagg," said Shandon. " You know its name well 
 enough, and and you know mine." 
 
 " And I know your address, too," said Wagg, but 
 this was spoken in an undertone, and the good-natured 
 Irishman was appeased almost in an instant after his 
 ebullition of spleen, and asked Wagg to drink wine with 
 him in a friendly voice. 
 
 When the ladies retired from the table, the talk grew 
 louder still ; and presently Wenham, in a courtly speech, 
 proposed that everybody should drink to the health of 
 the new Journal, eulogising highly the talents, wit, and 
 learning, of its editor, Captain Shandon. It was his 
 maxim never to lose the support of a newspaper man, 
 and in the course of that evening, he went round and 
 saluted every literary gentleman present with a privy 
 compliment specially addressed to him; informing this 
 one how great an impression had been made in Downing 
 Street by his last article, and telling that one how pro- 
 foundly his good friend, the Duke of So and So, had 
 been struck by the ability of the late numbers. 
 
 The evening came to a close, and in spite of all the 
 precautions to the contrary, poor Shandon reeled in his 
 walk, and went home to his new lodgings, with his faith- 
 ful wife by his side, and the cabman on his box jeering 
 at him. Wenham had a chariot of his own, which he 
 put at Pop joy's service; and the timid Miss Bunion 
 seeing Mr. Wagg, who was her neighbour, about to de- 
 part, insisted upon a seat in his carriage, much to that 
 gentleman's discomfiture. 
 
 Pen and Warrington walked home together in the 
 moonlight. " And now," Warrington said, " that you 
 have seen the men of letters, tell me, was I far wrong 
 in saying that there are thousands -of people in this town,
 
 556 PENDENNIS 
 
 who don't write books, who are, to the full, as clever 
 and intellectual as people who do? " 
 
 Pen was forced to confess that the literary personages 
 with whom he had become acquainted had not said much, 
 in the course of the night's conversation, that was worthy 
 to be remembered or quoted. In fact, not one word 
 about literature had been said during the whole course 
 of the night: and it may be whispered to those unini- 
 tiated people who are anxious to know the habits and 
 make the acquaintance of men of letters, that there are 
 no race of people who talk about books, or, perhaps, who 
 read books, so little as literary men.
 
 THE PALL MALL GAZETTE 
 
 ONSIDERABLE 
 
 success at first at- 
 tended the new 
 journal. It was 
 generally stated, 
 that an influen- 
 .tial political par- 
 ty supported the 
 paper; and great 
 names were cited amongst the contributors to its 
 columns. Was there any foundation for these rumours ? 
 We are not at liberty to say whether they were 
 well or ill-founded; but this much we may divulge, 
 that an article upon foreign policy, which was gen- 
 erally attributed to a noble Lord, whose connexion 
 with the Foreign Office is very well known, was in re- 
 ality composed by Captain Shandon, in the parlour of 
 the Bear and Staff public-house near Whitehall Stairs, 
 whither the printer's boy had tracked him, and where a 
 literary ally of his, Mr. Bludyer, had a temporary resi- 
 dence; and that a series of papers on finance questions, 
 which were universally supposed to be written by a 
 great Statesman of the House of Commons, were in 
 reality composed by Mr. George Warrington of the 
 Upper Temple. 
 
 That there may have been some dealings between the 
 " Pall Mall Gazette " and this influential party, is very 
 
 557
 
 558 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 possible. Percy Popjoy (whose father, Lord Falconet, 
 was a member of the party) might be seen not unfre- 
 
 quently ascending the stairs to Warrington's chambers; 
 and some information appeared in the paper which gave 
 it a character, and could only be got from very peculiar 
 sources. Several poems, feeble in thought, but loud and
 
 PENDENNIS 559 
 
 vigorous in expression, appeared in the " Pall Mall Ga- 
 zette," with the signature of " P.P." ; and it must be 
 owned that his novel was praised in the new journal in 
 a very outrageous manner. 
 
 In the political department of the paper Mr. Pen did 
 not take any share; but he was a most active literary 
 contributor. The " Pall Mall Gazette " had its offices, 
 as we have heard, in Catherine Street, in the Strand, 
 and hither Pen often came with his manuscripts in his 
 pocket, and with a great deal of bustle and pleasure; 
 such as a man feels at the outset of his literary career, 
 when to see himself in print is still a novel sensation, 
 and he yet pleases himself to think that his writings are 
 creating some noise in the world. 
 
 Here it was that Mr. Jack Finucane, the sub-editor, 
 compiled with paste and scissors the journal of which 
 he was supervisor. With an eagle eye he scanned all 
 the paragraphs of all the newspapers which had any- 
 thing to do with the world of fashion over which he pre- 
 sided. He didn't let a death or a dinner-party of the 
 aristocracy pass without having the event recorded in 
 the columns of his journal; and from the most recondite 
 provincial prints, and distant Scotch and Irish news- 
 papers, he fished out astonishing paragraphs and intelli- 
 gence regarding the upper classes of society. It was a 
 grand, nay, a touching sight, for a philosopher, to see 
 Jack Finucane, Esquire, with a plate of meat from the 
 cookshop, and a glass of porter from the public-house, 
 for his meal, recounting the feasts of the great, as if he 
 had been present at them; and in tattered trowsers and 
 dingy shirt sleeves, cheerfully describing and arranging 
 the most brilliant fetes of the world of fashion. The 
 incongruity of Finucane's avocation, and his manners
 
 560 PENDENNIS 
 
 and appearance, amused his new friend Pen. Since he 
 left his own native village, where his rank probably was 
 not very lofty, Jack had seldom seen any society but 
 such as used the parlour of the taverns which he fre- 
 quented, whereas from his writing you would have sup- 
 posed that he dined with ambassadors, and that his com- 
 mon lounge was the bow-window of White's. Errors 
 of description, it is true, occasionally slipped from his 
 pen; but the " Ballinafad Sentinel," of which he was 
 own correspondent, suffered by these, not the " Pall 
 Mall Gazette," in which Jack was not permitted to 
 write much, his London chiefs thinking that the scissors 
 and the paste were better wielded by him than the pen. 
 
 Pen took a great deal of pains with the writing of his 
 reviews, and having a pretty fair share of desultory 
 reading, acquired in the early years of his life, an eager 
 fancy and a keen sense of fun, his articles pleased his 
 chief and the public, and he was proud to think that he 
 deserved the money which he earned. We may be sure 
 that the " Pall Mall Gazette " was taken in regularly at 
 Fairoaks, and read with delight by the two ladies there. 
 It was received at Clavering Park, too, where we know 
 there was a young lady of great literary tastes; and old 
 Doctor Portman himself, to whom the widow sent her 
 paper after she had got her son's articles by heart, sig- 
 nified his approval of Pen's productions, saying that 
 the lad had spirit, taste, and fancy, and wrote, if not like 
 a scholar, at any rate like a gentleman. 
 
 And what was the astonishment and delight of our 
 friend Major Pendennis, on walking into one of his 
 clubs, the Regent, where Wenham, Lord Falconet, and 
 some other gentlemen of good reputation and fashion 
 were assembled, to hear them one day talking over a
 
 PENDENNIS 561 
 
 number of the " Pall Mall Gazette," and of an article 
 which appeared in its columns, making some bitter fun 
 of a book recently published by the wife of a celebrated 
 member of the opposition party. The book in question 
 was a Book of Travels in Spain and Italy, by the 
 Countess of Muffborough, in which it was difficult to 
 say which was the most wonderful, the French or the 
 English, in which languages her ladyship wrote indif- 
 ferently, and upon the blunders of which the critic 
 pounced with delighted mischief. The critic was no 
 other than Pen: he jumped and danced round about his 
 subject with the greatest jocularity and high spirits: 
 he showed up the noble lady's faults with admirable 
 mock gravity and decorum. There was not a word in 
 the article which was not polite and gentleman-like ; and 
 the unfortunate subject of the criticism was scarified 
 and laughed at during the operation. Wenham's bilious 
 countenance was puckered up with malign pleasure as 
 he read the critique. Lady Muffborough had not 
 asked him to her parties during the last year. Lord 
 Falconet giggled and laughed with all his heart; Lord 
 Muffborough and he had been rivals ever since they be- 
 gan life; and these complimented Major Pendennis, 
 who until now had scarcely paid any attention to some 
 hints which his Fairoaks correspondence threw out of 
 " dear Arthur's constant and severe literary occupa- 
 tions, which I fear may undermine the poor boy's 
 health," and had thought any notice of Mr. Pen and 
 his newspaper connexions quite below his dignity as a 
 Major and a gentleman. 
 
 But when the oracular Wenham praised the boy's 
 production ; when Lord Falconet, who had had the news 
 from Percy Popjoy, approved of the genius of young
 
 562 PENDENNIS 
 
 Pen ; when the great Lord Steyne himself, to whom the 
 Major referred the article, laughed and sniggered over 
 it, swore it was capital, and that the Muffborough would 
 writhe under it, like a whale under a harpoon, the Ma- 
 jor, as in duty bound, began to admire his nephew very 
 much, said, " By gad, the young rascal had some stuff 
 in him, and would do something; he had always said he 
 would do something; " and with a hand quite tremulous 
 with pleasure, the old gentleman sate down to write to 
 the widow at Fairoaks all that the great folks had said 
 in praise of Pen ; and he wrote to the young rascal, too, 
 asking when he would come and eat a chop with his old 
 uncle, and saying that he was commissioned to take him 
 to dinner at Gaunt House, for Lord Steyne liked any- 
 body who could entertain him, whether by his folly, wit, 
 or by his dulness, by his oddity, affectation, good spirits, 
 or any other quality. Pen flung his letter across the 
 table to Warrington; perhaps he was disappointed that 
 the other did not seem to be much affected by it. 
 
 The courage of young critics is prodigious: they 
 clamber up to the judgment seat, and, with scarce a 
 hesitation, give their opinion upon works the most in- 
 tricate or profound. Had Macaulay's History or Her- 
 schel's Astronomy been put before Pen at this pe- 
 riod, he would have looked through the volumes, 
 meditated his opinion over a cigar, and signified his 
 august approval of either author, as if the critic had 
 been their born superior and indulgent master and pa- 
 tron. By the help of the Biographic Universelle or the 
 British Museum, he would be able to take a rapid 
 riwmi of a historical period, and allude to names, dates, 
 and facts, in such a masterly, easy way, as to astonish 
 his mamma at home, who wondered where her boy could
 
 PENDENNIS 563 
 
 have acquired such a prodigious store of reading, and 
 himself, too, when he came to read over his articles two 
 or three months after they had been composed, and 
 when he had forgotten the subject and the books which 
 he had consulted. At that period of his life Mr. Pen 
 owns, that he would not have hesitated, at twenty-four 
 hours' notice, to pass an opinion upon the greatest 
 scholars, or to give a judgment upon the Encyclopaedia. 
 Luckily he had Warrington to laugh at him and to keep 
 down his impertinence by a constant and wholesome 
 ridicule, or he might have become conceited beyond all 
 sufferance; for Shandon liked the dash and flippancy 
 of his young aide-de-camp, and was, indeed, better 
 pleased with Pen's light and brilliant flashes, than with 
 the heavier metal which his elder coadjutor brought to 
 bear. 
 
 But though he might justly be blamed on the score 
 of impertinence and a certain prematurity of judg- 
 ment, Mr. Pen was a perfectly honest critic; a great 
 deal too candid for Mr. Bungay's purposes, indeed, 
 who grumbled sadly at his impartiality. Pen and his 
 chief, the Captain, had a dispute upon this subject 
 one day. " In the name of common sense, Mr. 
 Pendennis," Shandon asked, " what have you been do- 
 ingpraising one of Mr. Bacon's books? Bungay has 
 been with me in a fury this morning, at seeing a 
 laudatory article upon one of the works of the odious 
 firm over the way." 
 
 Pen's eyes opened with wide astonishment. " Do 
 you mean to say," he asked, " that we are to praise no 
 books that Bacon publishes: or that, if the books are 
 good, we are to say they are bad?" 
 
 " My good young friend for 'what do you suppose
 
 564 PENDENNIS 
 
 a benevolent publisher undertakes a critical journal, to 
 benefit his rival? " Shandon inquired. 
 
 ' To benefit himself certainly, but to tell the truth 
 too," Pen said " mat ccelum, to tell the truth." 
 
 " And my prospectus," said Shandon, with a laugh 
 and a sneer; " do you consider that was a work of mathe- 
 matical accuracy of statement? " 
 
 "Pardon me, that is not the question," Pen said; 
 " and I don't think you very much care to argue it. I 
 had some qualms of conscience about that same pro- 
 spectus, and debated the matter with my friend War- 
 rington. We agreed, however," Pen said, laughing, 
 " that because the prospectus was rather declamatory 
 and poetical, and the giant was painted upon the show- 
 board rather larger than the original, who was inside the 
 caravan, we need not be too scrupulous about this tri- 
 fling inaccuracy, but might do our part of the show, 
 without loss of character or remorse of conscience. We 
 are the fiddlers, and play our tunes only; you are the 
 showman." 
 
 " And leader of the van," said Shandon. " Well, I 
 am glad that your conscience gave you leave to play 
 for us." 
 
 ' Yes, but," said Pen, with a fine sense of the dig- 
 nity of his position, " we are all party men in England, 
 and I will stick to my party like a Briton. I will be 
 as good-natured as you like to our own side, he is a fool 
 who quarrels with his own nest; and I will hit the 
 enemy as hard as you like but with fair play, Captain, 
 if you please. One can't tell all the truth, I suppose; 
 but one can tell nothing but the truth: and I would 
 rather starve, by Jove, and never earn another penny 
 by my pen " (this redoubted instrument had now been
 
 Fen bean himself in print
 
 PENDENNIS 565 
 
 in use for some six weeks, and Pen spoke of it with vast 
 enthusiasm and respect) " than strike an opponent an 
 unfair blow, or, if called upon to place him, rank him 
 below his honest desert." 
 
 4 Well, Mr. Pendennis, when we want Bacon 
 smashed, we must get some other hammer to do it," 
 Shandon said, with fatal good-nature; and very likely 
 thought within himself, " A few years hence perhaps 
 the young gentleman won't be so squeamish." The 
 veteran Condottiere himself was no longer so scrupu- 
 lous. He had fought and killed on so many a side for 
 many a year past, that remorse had long left him. 
 " Gad," said he, " you've a tender conscience, Mr. Pen- 
 dennis. It's the luxury of all novices, and I may have 
 had one once myself; but that sort of bloom wears off 
 with the rubbing of the world, and I'm not going to the 
 trouble myself of putting on an artificial complexion, 
 like our pious friend Wenham, or our model of virtue, 
 Wagg." 
 
 " I don't know whether some people's hypocrisy is 
 not better, Captain, than others' cynicism." 
 
 " It's more profitable, at any rate," said the Captain, 
 biting his nails. ' That Wenham is as dull a quack as 
 ever quacked: and you see the carriage in which he 
 drove to dinner. 'Faith, it'll be a long time before Mrs. 
 Shandon will take a drive in her own chariot. God help 
 her, poor thing! " And Pen went away from his chief, 
 after their little dispute and colloquy, pointing his own 
 moral to the Captain's tale, and thinking to himself, 
 " Behold this man, stored with genius, wit, learning, 
 and a hundred good natural gifts: see how he has 
 wrecked them, by paltering with his honesty, and for- 
 getting to respect himself. Wilt thou remember thy-
 
 566 PENDENNIS 
 
 self, O Pen? thou art conceited enough! Wilt thou sell 
 thy honour for a bottle ? No, by heaven's grace, we will 
 be honest, whatever befals, and our mouths shall only 
 speak the truth when they open." 
 
 A punishment, or, at least, a trial, was in store for 
 Mr. Pen. In the very next Number of the " Pall Mall 
 Gazette," Warrington read out, with roars of laughter, 
 an article which by no means amused Arthur Penden- 
 nis, who was himself at work with a criticism for the 
 next week's Number of the same journal; and in which 
 the " Spring Annual " was ferociously maltreated by 
 some unknown writer. The person of all most cruelly 
 mauled was Pen himself. His verses had not appeared 
 with his own name in the " Spring Annual," but under 
 an assumed signature. As he had refused to review 
 the book, Shandon had handed it over to Mr. Bludyer, 
 with directions to that author to dispose of it. And he 
 had done so effectually. Mr. Bludyer, who was a man 
 of very considerable talent, and of a race which, I be- 
 lieve, is quite extinct in the press of our time, had a cer- 
 tain notoriety in his profession, and reputation for sav- 
 age humour. He smashed and trampled down the poor 
 spring flowers with no more mercy than a bull would 
 have on a parterre ; and having cut up the volume to his 
 heart's content, went and sold it at a bookstall, and pur- 
 chased a pint of brandy with the proceeds of the volume.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI 
 
 WHERE PEN APPEARS IN TOWN AND COUNTRY 
 
 ET us be allowed to pass over a few months of 
 the history of Mr. Arthur Pendennis's lifetime, 
 during the which, many events may have 
 occurred which were more 
 interesting and exciting 
 to himself, than they 
 would be likely to prove 
 to the reader of his present 
 memoirs. We left him, 
 in the last chapter, 
 regularly entered 
 upon his business as 
 a professional writer, 
 or literary hack, 
 as Mr. Warrington 
 chooses to style him- 
 self and his friend; 
 and we know how the life of any hack, legal or lit- 
 erary, in a curacy, or in a marching regiment, or at 
 a merchant's desk, is full of routine, and tedious of 
 description. One day's labour resembles another much 
 too closely. A literary man has often to work for his 
 bread against time, or against his will, or in spite of his 
 health, or of his indolence, or of his repugnance to the 
 subject on which he is called to exert himself, just like 
 any other daily toiler. When you want to make money 
 
 567
 
 568 PENDENNIS 
 
 by Pegasus (as he must, perhaps, who has no other sala- 
 ble property), farewell poetry and aerial flights: Pega- 
 sus only rises now like Mr. Green's balloon, at periods 
 advertised before-hand, and when the spectators' money 
 has been paid. Pegasus trots in harness, over the stony 
 pavement, and pulls a cart or a cab behind him. Often 
 Pegasus does his work with panting sides and trembling 
 knees, and not seldom gets a cut of the whip from his 
 driver. 
 
 Do not let us, however, be too prodigal of our pity 
 upon Pegasus. There is no reason why this animal 
 should be exempt from labour, or illness, or decay, any 
 more than any of the other creatures of God's world. If 
 he gets the whip, Pegasus very often deserves it, and I 
 for one am quite ready to protest with my friend, George 
 Warrington, against the doctrine which some poetical 
 sympathisers are inclined to put forward, viz., that men 
 of letters, and what is called genius, are to be exempt 
 from the prose duties of this daily, bread-wanting, tax- 
 paying life, and are not to be made to work and pay like 
 their neighbours. 
 
 Well then, the " Pall Mall Gazette " being duly es- 
 tablished, and Arthur Pendennis's merits recognized as 
 a flippant, witty, and amusing critic, he worked away 
 hard every week, preparing reviews of such works as 
 came into his department, and writing his reviews with 
 flippancy certainly, but with honesty, and to the best of 
 his power. It might be that a historian of three-score, 
 who had spent a quarter of a century in composing a 
 work of which our young gentleman disposed in the 
 course of a couple of days' reading at the British Mu- 
 seum, was not altogether fairly treated by such a facile 
 critic ; or that a poet, who had been elaborating sublime
 
 PENDENNIS 569 
 
 sonnets and odes until he thought them fit for the public 
 and for fame, was annoyed by two or three dozen pert 
 lines in Mr. Pen's review, in which the poet's claims were 
 settled by the critic, as if the latter were my lord on the 
 bench, and the author a miserable little suitor trembling 
 before him. The actors at the theatres complained of 
 him wofully, too, and very likely he was too hard upon 
 them. But there was not much harm done after all. It 
 is different now, as we know ; but there were so few great 
 historians, or great poets, or great actors, in Pen's time, 
 that scarce any at all came up for judgment before his 
 critical desk. Those who got a little whipping, got what 
 in the main was good for them; not that the judge was 
 any better or wiser than the persons whom he sentenced, 
 or indeed ever fancied himself so. Pen had a strong 
 sense of humour and justice, and had not therefore an 
 overweening respect for his own works; besides, he had 
 his friend Warrington at his elbow a terrible critic if 
 the young man was disposed to be conceited, and more 
 savage over Pen than ever he was to those whom he tried 
 at his literary assize. 
 
 By these critical labours, and by occasional contribu- 
 tions to leading articles of the journal, when, without 
 wounding his paper, this eminent publicist could consci- 
 entiously speak his mind, Mr. Arthur Pendennis gained 
 the sum of four pounds four shillings weekly, and with 
 no small pains and labour. Likewise he furnished 
 Magazines and Reviews with articles of his composition, 
 and is believed to have been (though on this score he 
 never chooses to speak) London correspondent of the 
 " Chatteris Champion," which at that time contained 
 some very brilliant and eloquent letters from the me- 
 tropolis. By these labours the fortunate youth was en-
 
 570 PENDENNIS 
 
 abled to earn a sum very nearly equal to four hundred 
 pounds a-year; and on the second Christmas after his 
 arrival in London, he actually brought a hundred pounds 
 to his mother, as a dividend upon the debt which he owed 
 to Laura. That Mrs. Pendennis read every word of her 
 son's works, and considered him to be the profoundest 
 thinker and most elegant writer of the day; that she 
 thought his retribution of the hundred pounds an act of 
 angelic virtue ; that she feared he was ruining his health 
 by his labours, and was delighted when he told her of the 
 society which he met, and of the great men of letters 
 and fashion whom he saw, will be imagined by all read- 
 ers who have seen son-worship amongst mothers, and 
 that charming simplicity of love with which women in 
 the country watch the career of their darlings in London. 
 If John has held such and such a brief; if Tom has been 
 invited to such and such a ball; or George has met this 
 or that great and famous man at dinner ; what a delight 
 there is in the hearts of mothers and sisters at home in 
 Somersetshire! How young Hopeful's letters are read 
 and remembered! What a theme for village talk they 
 give, and friendly congratulation ! In the second winter, 
 Pen came for a very brief space, and cheered the widow's 
 heart, and lightened up the lonely house at Fairoaks. 
 Helen had her son all to herself; Laura was away on a 
 visit to old Lady Rockminster; the folks of Clavering 
 Park were absent ; the very few old friends of the house, 
 Doctor Portman at their head, called upon Mr. Pen, and 
 treated him with marked respect; between mother and 
 son, it was all fondness, confidence, and affection. It 
 was the happiest fortnight of the widow's whole life; 
 perhaps in the lives of both of them. The holiday was 
 gone only too quickly; and Pen was back in the busy
 
 PENDENNIS 571 
 
 world, and the gentle widow alone again. She sent Ar- 
 thur's money to Laura: I don't know why this young 
 lady took the opportunity of leaving home when Pen 
 was coming thither, or whether he was the more piqued 
 or relieved by her absence. 
 
 He was by this time, by his own merits and his uncle's 
 introductions, pretty well introduced into London, and 
 known both in literary and polite circles. Amongst the 
 former his fashionable reputation stood him in no little 
 stead ; he was considered to be a gentleman of good pres- 
 ent means and better expectations, who wrote for his 
 pleasure, than which there cannot be a greater recom- 
 mendation to a young literary aspirant. Bacon, Bun- 
 gay, and Co., were proud to accept his articles; Mr. 
 Wenham asked him to dinner; Mr. Wagg looked upon 
 him with a favourable eye; and they reported how they 
 met him at the houses of persons of fashion, amongst 
 whom he was pretty welcome, as they did not trouble 
 themselves about his means, present or future ; as his ap- 
 pearance and address were good; and as he had got a 
 character for being a clever fellow. Finally, he was 
 asked to one house, because he was seen at another house : 
 and thus no small varieties of London life were pre- 
 sented to the young man : he was made familiar with all 
 sorts of people from Paternoster Row to Pimlico, and 
 was as much at home at Mayf air dining-tables as at those 
 tavern boards where some of his companions of the pen 
 were accustomed to assemble. 
 
 Full of high spirits and curiosity, easily adapting him- 
 self to all whom he met, the young fellow pleased him- 
 self in this strange variety and jumble of men, and made 
 himself welcome, or at ease at least, wherever he went. 
 He would breakfast, for instance, at Mr. Plover's of a
 
 572 
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 morning, in company with a Peer, a Bishop, a parlia- 
 mentary orator, two blue ladies of fashion, a popular 
 preacher, the author of the last new novel, and the very 
 latest lion imported from Egypt or from America ; and 
 
 would quit this distinguished society for the back room 
 at the newspaper office, where pens and ink and the wet 
 proof sheets were awaiting him. Here would be Finu- 
 cane, the sub-editor, with the last news from the Row: 
 and Shandon would come in presently, and giving a nod 
 .to Pen, would begin scribbling his leading article at the
 
 PENDENNIS 573 
 
 other end of the table, flanked by the pint of sherry, 
 which, when the attendant boy beheld him, was always 
 silently brought for the Captain : or Mr. Bludyer's roar- 
 ing voice would be heard in the front room, where that 
 truculent critic would impound the books on the counter 
 in spite of the timid remonstrances of Mr. Midge, the 
 publisher, and after looking through the volumes would 
 sell them at his accustomed book-stall, and having 
 drunken and dined upon the produce of the sale in a tav- 
 ern box, would call for ink and paper, and proceed to 
 " smash " the author of his dinner and the novel. To- 
 wards evening Mr. Pen would stroll in the direction of 
 his club, and take up Warrington there for a constitu- 
 tional walk. This exercise freed the lungs, and gave an 
 appetite for dinner, after which Pen had the privilege 
 to make his bow at some very pleasant houses which were 
 opened to him; or the town before him for amusement. 
 There was the Opera : or the Eagle Tavern ; or a ball to 
 go to in May Fair; or a quiet night with a cigar and a 
 book and a long talk with Warrington ; or a wonderful 
 new song at the Back Kitchen; at this time of his life 
 Mr. Pen beheld all sorts of places and men; and very 
 likely did not know how much he enjoyed himself until 
 long after, when balls gave him no pleasure, neither did 
 farces make him laugh; nor did the tavern joke produce 
 the least excitement in him; nor did the loveliest dancer 
 that ever showed her ankles cause him to stir from his 
 chair after dinner. At his present mature age all these 
 pleasures are over: and the times have passed away too. 
 It is but a very very few years since but the time is 
 gone, and most of the men. Bludyer will no more bully 
 authors or cheat landlords of their score. Shandon, the 
 learned and thriftless, the witty and unwise, sleeps his
 
 574 PENDENNIS 
 
 last sleep. They buried honest Doolan the other day: 
 never will he cringe or flatter, never pull long-bow or 
 empty whiskey-noggin any more. 
 
 The London season was now blooming in its full 
 vigour, and the fashionable newspapers abounded with 
 information regarding the grand banquets, routs, and 
 balls which were enlivening the polite world. Our gra- 
 cious Sovereign was holding levees and drawing-rooms 
 at St. James's: the bow-windows of the clubs were 
 crowded with the heads of respectable red-faced news- 
 paper-reading gentlemen: along the Serpentine trailed 
 thousands of carriages: squadrons of dandy horsemen 
 trampled over Rotten Row : everybody was in town in a 
 word; and of course Major Arthur Pendennis, who was 
 somebody, was not absent. 
 
 With his head tied up in a smart bandana handker- 
 chief, and his meagre carcass enveloped in a brilliant 
 Turkish dressing-gown, the worthy gentleman sate on 
 a certain morning by his fire-side, letting his feet gently 
 simmer in a bath, whilst he took his early cup of tea, and 
 perused his " Morning Post." He could not have faced 
 the day without his two hours' toilet, without his early 
 cup of tea, without his " Morning Post." I suppose no- 
 body in the world except Morgan, not even Morgan's 
 master himself, knew how feeble and ancient the Major 
 was growing, and what numberless little comforts he re- 
 quired. 
 
 If men sneer, as our habit is, at the artifices of an old 
 beauty, at her paint, perfumes, ringlets; at those in- 
 numerable, and to us unknown, stratagems with which 
 she is said to remedy the ravages of time and reconstruct 
 the charms whereof years have bereft her; the ladies, it
 
 PENDENNIS 575 
 
 is to be presumed, are not on their side altogether igno- 
 rant that men are vain as well as they, and that the toilets 
 of old bucks are to the full as elaborate as their own. 
 How is it that old Blushington keeps that constant little 
 rose-tint on his cheeks; and where does old Blondel get 
 the preparation which makes his silver hair pass for 
 golden? Have you ever seen Lord Hotspur get off his 
 horse when he thinks nobody is looking? Taken out of 
 his stirrups, his shiny boots can hardly totter up the steps 
 of Hotspur House. He is a dashing young nobleman 
 still as you see the back of him in Rotten Row; when 
 you behold him on foot, what an old, old fellow! Did 
 you ever form to yourself any idea of Dick Lacy (Dick 
 has been Dick these sixty years) in a natural state, and 
 without his stays? All these men are objects whom the 
 observer of human life and manners may contemplate 
 with as much profit as the most elderly Belgravian Ve- 
 nus, or inveterate Mayfair Jezebel. An old reprobate 
 daddy longlegs, who has never said his prayers (except 
 perhaps in public) these fifty years: an old buck who 
 still clings to as many of the habits of youth as his feeble 
 grasp of health can hold by : who has given up the bottle, 
 but sits with young fellows over it, and tells naughty 
 stories upon toast and water who has given up beauty, 
 but still talks about it as wickedly as the youngest roue 
 in company such an old fellow, I say, if any parson in 
 Pimlico or St. James's were to order the beadles to bring 
 him into the middle aisle, and there set him in an arm- 
 chair, and make a text of him, and preach about him to 
 the congregation, could be turned to a wholesome use 
 for once in his life, and might be surprised to find that 
 some good thoughts came out of him. But, we are wan- 
 dering from our text, the honest Major, who sits all this
 
 576 PENDENNIS 
 
 while with his feet cooling in the bath: Morgan takes 
 them out of that place of purification, and dries them 
 daintily, and proceeds to set the old gentleman on his 
 legs, with waistband and wig, starched cravat, and spot- 
 less boots and gloves. 
 
 It was during these hours of the toilet that Morgan 
 and his employer had their confidential conversations, 
 for they did not meet much at other times of the day 
 the Major abhorring the society of his own chairs and 
 tables in his lodgings; and Morgan, his master's toilet 
 over and letters delivered, had his time very much on his 
 own hands. 
 
 This spare time the active and well-mannered gentle- 
 man bestowed among the valets and butlers of the no- 
 bility, his acquaintance; and Morgan Pendennis, as he 
 was styled, for, by such compound names, gentlemen's 
 gentlemen are called in their private circles, was a fre- 
 quent and welcome guest at some of the very highest 
 tables in this town. He was a member of two influential 
 clubs in Mayfair and Pimlico; and he was thus enabled 
 to know the whole gossip of the town, and entertain 
 his master very agreeably during the two hours' toilet 
 conversation. He knew a hundred tales and legends re- 
 garding persons of the very highest ton, whose valets 
 canvass their august secrets, just, my dear madam, as 
 our own parlour-maids and dependents in the kitchen 
 discuss our characters, our stinginess and generosity, our 
 pecuniary means or embarrassments, and our little do- 
 mestic or connubial tiffs and quarrels. If I leave this 
 manuscript open on my table, I have not the slightest 
 doubt Betty will read it, and they will talk it over in 
 the lower regions to-night ; and to-morrow she will bring 
 in my breakfast with a face of such entire imperturbable
 
 PENDENNIS 577 
 
 innocence, that no mortal could suppose her guilty of 
 playing the spy. If you and the Captain have high 
 words upon any subject, which is just possible, the cir- 
 cumstances of the quarrel, and the characters of both of 
 you, will be discussed with impartial eloquence over the 
 kitchen tea-table; and if Mrs. Smith's maid should by 
 chance be taking a dish of tea with yours, her presence 
 will not undoubtedly act as a restraint upon the discus- 
 sion in question ; her opinion will be given with candour ; 
 and the next day her mistress will probably know that 
 Captain and Mrs. Jones have been a quarrelling as usual. 
 Nothing is secret. Take it as a rule that John knows 
 everything: and as in our humble world so in the great- 
 est: a duke is no more a hero to his valet-de-chambre 
 than you or I ; and his Grace's Man at his club, in com- 
 pany doubtless with other Men of equal social rank, 
 talks over his master's character and affairs with the in- 
 genuous truthfulness which befits gentlemen who are 
 met together in confidence. Who is a niggard and 
 screws up his money-boxes: who is in the hands of the 
 money-lenders, and is putting his noble name on the back 
 of bills of exchange: who is intimate with whose wife: 
 who wants whom to marry her daughter, and which he 
 won't, no not at any price: all these facts gentlemen's 
 confidential gentlemen discuss confidentially, and are 
 known and examined by every person who has any 
 claim to rank in genteel society. In a word, if old Pen- 
 dennis himself was said to know everything, and was at 
 once admirably scandalous and delightfully discreet; it 
 is but justice to Morgan to say, that a great deal of his 
 master's information was supplied to that worthy man 
 by his valet, who went out and foraged knowledge for 
 him. Indeed, what more effectual plan is there to get
 
 578 PENDENNIS 
 
 a knowledge of London society, than to begin at the 
 foundation that is, at the kitchen-floor? 
 
 So Mr. Morgan and his employer conversed as the 
 latter's toilet proceeded. There had been a Drawing- 
 room on the day previous, and the Major read among the 
 presentations that of Lady Clavering by Lady Rock- 
 minster, and of Miss Amory by her mother Lady Claver- 
 ing, and in a further part of the paper their dresses 
 were described, with a precision and in a jargon which 
 will puzzle and amuse the antiquary of future genera- 
 tions. The sight of these names carried Pendennis back 
 to the country. " How long have the Claverings been 
 in London? " he asked; " pray, Morgan, have you seen 
 any of their people? " 
 
 "Sir Francis have sent away his foring man, sir," Mr. 
 Morgan replied ; " and have took a friend of mine as own 
 man, sir. Indeed he applied on my reckmendation. 
 You may recklect Towler, sir, tall red-'aired man but 
 dyes his 'air. Was groom of the chambers in Lord Le- 
 vant's family till his Lordship broke hup. It's a fall for 
 Towler, sir; but pore men can't be particklar," said the 
 valet, with a pathetic voice. 
 
 " Devilish hard on Towler, by gad! " said the Major, 
 amused, " and not pleasant for Lord Levant he, he! " 
 
 " Always knew it was coming, sir. I spoke to you of 
 it Michaelmas was four years: when her Ladyship put 
 the diamonds in pawn. It was Towler, sir, took 'em in 
 two cabs to Dobree's and a good deal of the plate went 
 the same way. Don't you remember seeing of it at 
 Blackwall, with the Levant arms and coronick, and 
 Lord Levant sett'n' opp'sit' to it at the Marquis of 
 Steyne's dinner? Beg your pardon; did I cut you, sir? " 
 
 Morgan was now operating upon the Major's chin
 
 PENDENNIS 579 
 
 he continued the theme while strapping the skilful razor. 
 " They've took a house in Grosvenor Place, and are com- 
 ing out strong, sir. Her ladyship's going to give three 
 parties, besides a dinner a-week, sir. Her fortune won't 
 stand it can't stand it." 
 
 " Gad, she had a devilish good cook when I was at 
 Fairoaks," the Major said, with very little compassion 
 for the widow Amory's fortune. 
 
 " Marobblan was his name, sir; Marobblan's gone 
 away, sir," Morgan said, and the Major, this time, 
 with hearty sympathy, said, " he was devilish sorry to 
 lose him." 
 
 ' There's been a tremenjuous row about that Mosseer 
 Marobblan," Morgan continued. " At a ball at Bay- 
 mouth, sir, bless his impadence, he challenged Mr. Har- 
 thur to fight a jewel, sir, which Mr. Harthur was very 
 near knocking him down, and pitchin' him outa- 
 winder, and serve him right; but Chevalier Strong, 
 sir, came up and stopped the shindy I beg pardon, the 
 holtercation, sir them French cooks has as much pride 
 and hinsolence as if they was real gentlemen." 
 
 " I heard something of that quarrel," said the Major; 
 " but Mirobolant was not turned off for that? " 
 
 " No, sir that affair, sir, which Mr. Harthur for- 
 gave it him and be'aved most handsome, was hushed hup : 
 it was about Miss Hamory, sir, that he 'ad 'is dismissial. 
 Those French fellers, they fancy everybody is in love 
 with 'em ; and he climbed up the large grape vine to her 
 winder, sir, and was a trying to get in, when he was 
 caught, sir; and Mr. Strong came out, and they got the 
 garden-engine and played on him, and there was no end 
 of a row, sir." 
 
 " Confound his impudence! You don't mean to say
 
 580 PENDENNIS 
 
 Miss Amory encouraged him," cried the Major, amazed 
 at a peculiar expression in Mr. Morgan's countenance. 
 Morgan resumed his imperturbable demeanour. 
 " Know nothing about it, sir. Servants don't know them 
 kind of things the least. Most probably there was no- 
 thing in it so many lies is told about families Marob- 
 blan went away, bag and baggage, saucepans, and pi- 
 anna, and all the feller 'ad a pianna, and wrote po'try 
 in French, and he took a lodging at Clavering, and he 
 hankered about the primises, and it was said that Ma- 
 dame Fribsby, the milliner, brought letters to Miss 
 Hamory, though I don't believe a word about it; nor 
 that he tried to pi'son hisself with charcoal, which it was 
 all a humbug betwigst him and Madame Fribsby; and 
 he was nearly shot by the keeper in the park." 
 
 In the course of that very day, it chanced that the 
 Major had stationed himself in the great window of 
 Bays's Club in St. James's Street, at the hour in the 
 afternoon when you see a half -score of respectable old 
 bucks similarly recreating themselves (Bays's is rather 
 an old-fashioned place of resort now, and many of its 
 members more than middle-aged ; but in the time of the 
 Prince Regent, these old fellows occupied the same win- 
 dow, and were some of the very greatest dandies in this 
 empire) Major Pendennis was looking from the great 
 window, and spied his nephew Arthur walking down the 
 street in company with his friend Mr. Popjoy. 
 
 " Look I " said Popjoy to Pen, as they passed, " did 
 you ever pass Bays's at four o'clock, without seeing that 
 collection of old fogies? It's a regular museum. They 
 ought to be cast in wax, and set up at Madame Tus- 
 saud's-"
 
 PENDENNIS 
 
 581 
 
 -In a chamber of old horrors by themselves," Pen 
 said, laughing. 
 
 " In the chamber of horrors! Gad, dooced good! " 
 Pop cried. * They are old rogues, most of 'em, and no 
 mistake. There's old Blondel; there's my uncle Colchi- 
 cum, the most confounded old sinner in Europe ; there's
 
 582 PENDENNIS 
 
 hullo! there's somebody rapping the window and nod- 
 ding at us." 
 
 " It's my uncle, the Major," said Pen. " Is he an old 
 sinner too? " 
 
 " Notorious old rogue," Pop said, wagging his head. 
 (" Notowious old wogue," he pronounced the words, 
 thereby rendering them much more emphatic.) " He's 
 beckoning you in ; he wants to speak to you." 
 
 " Come in too," Pen said. 
 
 "Can't," replied the other. " Cut uncle Col. two 
 years ago, about Mademoiselle Frangipane Ta, ta," 
 and the young sinner took leave of Pen, and the club of 
 the elder criminals, and sauntered into Blacquiere's, an 
 adjacent establishment frequented by reprobates of his 
 own age. 
 
 Colchicum, Blondel, and the senior bucks had just 
 been conversing about the Clavering family, whose ap- 
 pearance in London had formed the subject of Major 
 Pendennis's morning conversation with his valet. Mr. 
 Blondel's house was next to that of Sir Francis Claver- 
 ing, in Grosvenor Place : giving very good dinners him- 
 self, he had remarked some activity in his neighbour's 
 kitchen. Sir Francis, indeed, had a new chef, who had 
 come in more than once and dressed Mr. Blondel's din- 
 ner for him; that gentleman having only a remarkably 
 expert female artist permanently engaged in his estab- 
 lishment, and employing such chefs of note as happened 
 to be free on the occasion of his grand banquets. ' They 
 go to a devilish expense and see devilish bad company 
 as yet, I hear," Mr. Blondel said, " they scour the 
 streets, by gad, to get people to dine with 'em. Cham- 
 pignon says it breaks his heart to serve up a dinner to 
 their society. What a shame it is that those low people
 
 PENDENNIS 583 
 
 should have money at all," cried Mr. Blondel, whose 
 grandfather had been a reputable leather-breeches 
 maker, and whose father had lent money to the Princes. 
 
 " I wish I had fallen in with the widow myself," 
 sighed Lord Colchicum, " and not been laid up with that 
 confounded gout at Leghorn. I would have married 
 the woman myself. I'm told she has six hundred thou- 
 sand pounds in the Threes." 
 
 " Not quite so much as that, I knew her family in 
 India," Major Pendennis said. " I knew her family 
 in India ; her father was an enormously rich old indigo- 
 planter, know all about her, Clavering has the next 
 estate to ours in the country. Ha! there's my nephew 
 walking with " " With mine, the infernal young 
 scamp," said Lord Colchicum, glowering at Popjoy out 
 of his heavy eyebrows; and he turned away from the 
 window as Major Pendennis tapped upon it. 
 
 The Major was in high good-humour. The sun was 
 bright, the air brisk and invigorating. He had deter- 
 mined upon a visit to Lady Clavering on that day, and 
 bethought him that Arthur would be a good companion 
 for the walk across the Green Park to her ladyship's 
 door. Master Pen was not displeased to accompany his 
 illustrious relative, who pointed out a dozen great men 
 in their brief transit through St. James's Street, and got 
 bows from a Duke, at a crossing, a Bishop (on a cob), 
 and a Cabinet Minister with an umbrella. The Duke 
 gave the elder Pendennis a finger of a pipe-clayed glove 
 to shake, which the Major embraced with great venera- 
 tion ; and all Pen's blood tingled, as he found himself in 
 actual communication, as it were, with this famous man 
 (for Pen had possession of the Major's left arm, whilst 
 that gentleman's other wing w.as engaged with his
 
 584 PENDENNIS 
 
 Grace's right), and he wished all Grey Friars' School, 
 all Oxbridge University, all Paternoster Row and the 
 Temple, and Laura and his mother at Fairoaks, could 
 be standing on each side of the street, to see the meeting 
 between him and his uncle, and the most famous duke 
 in Christendom. 
 
 " How do, Pendennis? fine day," were his Grace's 
 remarkable words, and with a nod of his august head he 
 passed on in a blue frock-coat and spotless white duck 
 trowsers, in a white stock, with a shining buckle behind. 
 
 Old Pendennis, whose likeness to his Grace has been 
 remarked, began to imitate him unconsciously, after they 
 had parted, speaking with curt sentences, after the man- 
 ner of the great man. We have all of us, no doubt, met 
 with more than one military officer who has so imitated 
 the manner of a certain Great Captain of the Age ; and 
 has, perhaps, changed his own natural character and dis- 
 position, because Fate had endowed him with an aqui- 
 line nose. In like manner have we not seen many an- 
 other man pride himself on having a tall forehead and 
 a supposed likeness to Mr. Canning? many another go 
 through life swelling with self -gratification on account 
 of an imagined resemblance (we say " imagined," be- 
 cause that anybody should be really like that most beau- 
 tiful and perfect of men is impossible) to the great and 
 revered George IV.: many third parties, who wore low 
 necks to their dresses because they fancied that Lord By- 
 ron and themselves were similar in appearance : and has 
 not the grave closed but lately upon poor Tom Bicker- 
 staff, who, having no more imagination than Mr. Joseph 
 Hume, looked in the glass and fancied himself like 
 Shakspeare? shaved his forehead so as farther to re- 
 semble the immortal bard, wrote tragedies incessantly,
 
 PENDENN Y IS 585 
 
 and died perfectly crazy actually perished of his fore- 
 head? These or similar freaks of vanity most people 
 who have frequented the world must have seen in their 
 experience. Pen laughed in his roguish sleeve at the 
 manner in which his uncle began to imitate the great 
 man from whom they had just parted: but Mr. Pen was 
 as vain in his own way, perhaps, as the elder gentleman, 
 and strutted, with a very consequential air of his own, 
 by the Major's side. 
 
 ' Yes, my dear boy," said the old bachelor, as they 
 sauntered through the Green Park, where many poor 
 children were disporting happily, and errand boys were 
 playing at toss halfpenny, and black sheep were grazing 
 in the sunshine, and an actor was learning his part on a 
 bench, and nursery maids and their charges sauntered 
 here and there, and several couples were walking in a 
 leisurely manner; " yes, depend on it, my boy; for a poor 
 man, there is nothing like having good acquaintances. 
 Who were those men, with whom you saw me in the bow 
 window at Bays's? Two were Peers of the realm. 
 Hobanob will be a Peer, as soon as his grand-uncle dies, 
 and he has had his third seizure; and of the other four, 
 not one has less than his seven thousand a-year. Did 
 you see that dark blue brougham, with that tremendous 
 stepping horse, waiting at the door of the club? You'll 
 know it again. It is Sir Hugh Trumpington's; he was 
 never known to walk in his life; never appears in the 
 streets on foot never: and if he is going two doors off, 
 to see his mother, the old dowager (to whom I shall 
 certainly introduce you, for she receives some of the 
 best company in London ) , gad, sir, he mounts his horse 
 at No. 23, and dismounts again at No. 25A. He is now 
 up stairs, at Bays's, playing picquet with Count Punter:
 
 586 PENDENNIS 
 
 he is the second-best player in England as well he 
 may be ; for he plays every day of his life, except Sun- 
 days ( for Sir Hugh is an uncommonly religious man ) , 
 from half-past three till half-past seven, when he dresses 
 for dinner." 
 
 " A very pious manner of spending his time," Pen 
 said, laughing, and thinking that his uncle was falling 
 into the twaddling state. 
 
 " Gad, sir, that is not the question. A man of his es- 
 tate may employ his time as he chooses. When you are a 
 baronet, a county member, with ten thousand acres of the 
 best land in Cheshire, and such a place as Trumpington 
 (though he never goes there), you may do as you like." 
 
 " And so that was his brougham, sir, was it? " the 
 nephew said, with almost a sneer. 
 
 "His brougham O ay, yes 1 and that brings me 
 back to my point revenons a nos moutons. Yes, begad ! 
 revenons a nos moutons. Well, that brougham is mine 
 if I choose, between four and seven. Just as much mine 
 as if I jobbed it from Tilbury's, begad, for thirty pound 
 a-month. Sir Hugh is the best-natured fellow in the 
 world ; and if it hadn't been so fine an afternoon as it is, 
 you and I would have been in that brougham at this very 
 minute, on our way to Grosvenor Place. That is the 
 benefit of knowing rich men; I dine for nothing, sir; 
 -I go into the country, and I'm mounted for nothing. 
 Other fellows keep hounds and gamekeepers for me. Sic 
 vos non vobis> as we used to say at Grey Friars, hey? I'm 
 of the opinion of my old friend Leech, of the Forty- 
 fourth; and a devilish good shrewd fellow he was, as 
 most Scotchmen are. Gad, sir, Leech used to say, ' He 
 was so poor that he couldn't afford to know a poor 
 
 man.' '
 
 PENDENNIS 587 
 
 " You don't act up to your principles, uncle," Pen 
 said, good-naturedly. 
 
 " Up to my principles; how, sir? " the Major asked, 
 rather testily. 
 
 ' You would have cut me in Saint James's Street, sir," 
 Pen said, " were your practice not more benevolent than 
 your theory; you who live with dukes and magnates of 
 the land, and would take no notice of a poor devil like 
 me." By which speech we may see that Mr. Pen was 
 getting on in the world, and could flatter as well as 
 laugh in his sleeve. 
 
 Major Pendennis was appeased instantly, and very 
 much pleased. He tapped affectionately his nephew's 
 arm on which he was leaning, and said, ' You, sir, you 
 are my flesh and blood! Hang it, sir, I've been very 
 proud of you and very fond of you, but for your con- 
 founded follies and extravagances and wild oats, sir, 
 which I hope, you've sown. Yes, begad ! I hope you've 
 sown 'em; I hope you've sown 'em, begad! My object, 
 Arthur, is to make a man of you to see you well placed 
 in the world, as becomes one of your name and my own, 
 sir. You have got yourself a little reputation by your 
 literary talents, which I am very far from undervaluing, 
 though in my time, begad, poetry and genius and that 
 sort of thing were devilish disreputable. There was poor 
 Byron, for instance, who ruined himself, and contracted 
 the worst habits by living with poets and newspaper- 
 writers, and people of that kind. But the times are 
 changed now there's a run upon literature clever fel- 
 lows get into the best houses in town, begad! Tempora 
 mutantur, sir, and, by Jove, I suppose whatever is is 
 right, as Shakspeare says." 
 
 Pen did not think fit to tell his uncle who was the
 
 588 PENDENNIS 
 
 author who had made use of that remarkable phrase, and 
 here descending from the Green Park, the pair made 
 their way into Grosvenor Place, and to the door of the 
 mansion occupied there by Sir Francis and Lady Clav- 
 ering. 
 
 The dining-room shutters of this handsome mansion 
 were freshly gilded; the knockers shone gorgeous upon 
 the newly-painted door ; the balcony before the drawing- 
 room bloomed with a portable garden of the most beau- 
 tiful plants, and with flowers, white, and pink, and scar- 
 let ; the windows of the upper room ( the sacred chamber 
 and dressing-room of my lady, doubtless), and even a 
 pretty little casement of the third story, which keen- 
 sighted Mr. Pen presumed to belong to the virgin 
 bedroom of Miss Blanche Amory, were similarly 
 adorned with floral ornaments, and the whole exterior 
 face of the house presented the most brilliant aspect 
 which fresh new paint, shining plate glass, newly cleaned 
 bricks, and spotless mortar, could offer to the beholder. 
 
 " How Strong must have rejoiced in organising all 
 this splendour," thought Pen. He recognised the 
 Chevalier's genius in the magnificence before him. 
 
 " Lady Clavering is going out for her drive," the 
 Major said. " We shall only have to leave our paste- 
 boards, Arthur." He used the word " pasteboards," 
 having heard it from some of the ingenious youth of the 
 nobility about town, and as a modern phrase suited to 
 Pen's tender years. Indeed, as the two gentlemen 
 reached the door, a landau drove up, a magnificent yel- 
 low carriage, lined with brocade or satin of a faint cream 
 colour, drawn by wonderful grey horses, with flaming 
 ribbons, and harness blazing all over with crests: no less 
 than three of these heraldic emblems surmounted the
 
 PENDENNIS 589 
 
 coats of arms on the panels, and these shields contained 
 a prodigious number of quarterings, betokening the an- 
 tiquity and splendour of the houses of Clavering and 
 Snell. A coachman in a tight silver wig surmounted 
 the magnificent hammercloth (whereon the same arms 
 were worked in bullion), and controlled the prancing 
 greys a young man still, but of a solemn countenance, 
 with a laced waistcoat and buckles in his shoes little 
 buckles, unlike those which John and Jeames, the foot- 
 men, wear, and which we know are large, and spread ele- 
 gantly over the foot. 
 
 One of the leaves of the hall door was opened, and 
 John one of the largest of his race was leaning 
 against the door pillar, with his ambrosial hair pow- 
 dered, his legs crossed ; Leautif ul, silk-stockinged ; in his 
 hand his cane, gold-headed, dolichoskion. Jeames was 
 invisible, but near at hand, waiting in the hall, with the 
 gentleman who does not wear livery, and ready to fling 
 down the roll of hair-cloth over which her ladyship was 
 to step to her carriage. These things and men, the 
 which to tell of demands time, are seen in the glance of 
 a practised eye: and, in fact, the Major and Pen had 
 scarcely crossed the street, when the second battant of 
 the door flew open ; the horse-hair carpet tumbled down 
 the door-steps to those of the carriage; John was open- 
 ing it on one side of the emblazoned door, and Jeames 
 on the other, and two ladies, attired in the highest style 
 of fashion, and accompanied by a third, who carried a 
 Blenheim spaniel, yelping in a light blue ribbon, came 
 forth to ascend the carriage. 
 
 Miss Amory was the first to enter, which she did with 
 aerial lightness, and took the place which she liked best. 
 Lady Clavering next followed, but her ladyship was
 
 590 PENDENNIS 
 
 more mature of age and heavy of foot, and one of those 
 feet, attired in a green satin boot, with some part of a 
 stocking, which was very fine, whatever the ankle might 
 be which it encircled, might be seen swaying on the car- 
 riage-step, as her ladyship leaned for support on the arm 
 of the unbending Jeames, by the enraptured observer of 
 female beauty who happened to be passing at the time 
 of this imposing ceremonial. 
 
 The Pendennises senior and junior beheld those 
 charms as they came up to the door the Major looking 
 grave and courtly, and Pen somewhat abashed at the 
 carriage and its owners; for he thought of sundry little 
 passages at Clavering, which made his heart beat rather 
 quick. 
 
 At that moment Lady Clavering, looking round, saw 
 the pair she was on the first carriage-step, and would 
 have been in the vehicle in another second, but she gave 
 a start backwards (which caused some of the powder 
 to fly from the hair of ambrosial Jeames), and crying 
 out, " Lor', if it isn't Arthur Pendennis and the old Ma- 
 jor I " jumped back to terra firma directly, and holding 
 out two fat hands, encased in tight orange-coloured 
 gloves, the good-natured woman warmly greeted the 
 Major and his nephew. 
 
 " Come in, both of you. Why haven't you been be- 
 fore? Get out, Blanche, and come and see your old 
 friends. O, I'm so glad to see you. We've been waitin' 
 and waitin' for you ever so long. Come in, luncheon 
 ain't gone down," cried out this hospitable lady, squeez- 
 ing Pen's hand in both hers (she had dropped the Ma- 
 jor's after a brief wrench of recognition), and Blanche, 
 casting up her eyes towards the chimneys, descended 
 from the carriage presently, with a timid, blushing, ap-
 
 PENDENNIS 591 
 
 pealing look, and gave a little hand to Major Pen- 
 dennis. 
 
 The companion with the spaniel looked about irreso- 
 lute, and doubting whether she should not take Fido his 
 airing; but she too turned right about face and entered 
 the house, after Lady Clavering, her daughter, and the 
 two gentlemen. And the carriage, with the prancing 
 greys, was left unoccupied, save by the coachman in the 
 silver wig.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII 
 
 IN WHICH THE SYLPH REAPPEARS 
 
 ETTER folks than Mor- 
 gan, the valet, were 
 not so well in- 
 structed as that 
 gentleman, regard- 
 ing the amount of 
 Lady Clavering's 
 riches; and the le- 
 gend in London up- 
 on her Ladyship's 
 arrival in the po- 
 lite metropolis, was, 
 that her fortune 
 was enormous. In- 
 digo factories, opi- 
 um clippers, hanks 
 overflowing with rupees, diamonds and jewels of native 
 princes, and vast sums of interest paid by them for loans 
 contracted by themselves or their predecessors to Lady 
 Clavering's father, were mentioned as sources of her 
 wealth. Her account at her London banker's was posi- 
 tively known, and the sum embraced so many cyphers 
 as to create as many O's of admiration in the wondering 
 hearer. It was a known fact that an envoy from an In- 
 dian Prince, a Colonel Altamont, the Nawaub of Luck- 
 now's prime favourite, an extraordinary man, who had, 
 
 592
 
 PENDENNIS 593 
 
 it was said, embraced Mahometanism, and undergone 
 a thousand wild and perilous adventures, was at present 
 in this country, trying to negotiate with the Begum 
 Clavering, the sale of the Nawaub's celebrated nose- 
 ring diamond, " the light of the Dewan." 
 
 Under the title of the Begum, Lady Clavering's fame 
 began to spread in London before she herself descended 
 upon the Capital, and as it has been the boast of De- 
 lolme, and Blackstone, and all panegyrists of the 'British 
 Constitution, that we admit into our aristocracy merit of 
 every kind, and that the lowliest-born man, if he but 
 deserve it, may wear the robes of a peer, and sit along- 
 side of a Cavendish or a Stanley: so it ought to be the 
 boast of our good society, that haughty though it be, 
 naturally jealous of its privileges, and careful who shall 
 be admitted into its circle, yet, if an individual be but 
 rich enough, all barriers are instantly removed, and he 
 or she is welcomed, as from his wealth he merits to be. 
 This fact shows our British independence and honest 
 feeling our higher orders are not such mere haughty 
 aristocrats as the ignorant represent them: on the con- 
 trary, if a man have money they will hold out their hands 
 to him, eat his dinners, dance at his balls, marry his 
 daughters, or give their own lovely girls to his sons, as 
 affably as your commonest roturier would do. 
 
 As he had superintended the arrangements of the 
 country mansion, our friend, the Chevalier Strong, gave 
 the benefit of his taste and advice to the fashionable Lon- 
 don upholsterers, who prepared the town house for the 
 reception of the Clavering family. In the decoration 
 of this elegant abode, honest Strong's soul rejoiced as 
 much as if he had been himself its proprietor. He hung 
 and re-hung the pictures, he studied the positions of
 
 594 PENDENNIS 
 
 sofas, he had interviews with wine merchants and pur- 
 veyors who were to supply the new establishment; and 
 at the same time the Baronet's factotum and confidential 
 friend took the opportunity of furnishing his own cham- 
 bers, and stocking his snug little cellar: his friends com- 
 plimented him upon the neatness of the former; and the 
 select guests who came in to share Strong's cutlet now 
 found a bottle of excellent claret to accompany the meal. 
 The Chevalier was now, as he said, " in clover: " he had 
 a very comfortable set of rooms in Shepherd's Inn. He 
 was waited on by a former Spanish Legionary and com- 
 rade of his whom he had left at a breach of a Spanish 
 fort, and found at a crossing in Tottenham-court Road, 
 and whom he had elevated to the rank of body-servant to 
 himself and to the chum who, at present, shared his lodg- 
 ings. This was no other than the favourite of the Na- 
 waub of Lucknow, the valiant Colonel Altamont. 
 
 No man was less curious, or at any rate, more discreet, 
 than Xed Strong, and he did not care to enquire into 
 the mysterious connection which, very soon after their 
 first meeting at Baymouth, was established between Sir 
 Francis Clavering and the envoy of the Nawaub. The 
 latter knew some secret regarding the former, which put 
 Clavering into his power, somehow; and Strong, who 
 knew that his patron's early life had been rather irregu- 
 lar, and that his career with his regiment in India had 
 not been brilliant, supposed that the Colonel, who swore 
 he knew Clavering well at Calcutta, had some hold upon 
 Sir Francis, to which the latter was forced to yield. In 
 truth, Strong had long understood Sir Francis Claver- 
 ing's character, as that of a man utterly weak in purpose, 
 in principle, and intellect, a moral and physical trifler 
 and poltroon.
 
 PENDENNIS 595 
 
 With poor Clavering, his Excellency had had one or 
 two interviews after their Bay mouth meeting, the na- 
 ture of which conversations the Baronet did not confide 
 to Strong: although he sent letters to Altamont by that 
 gentleman, who was his ambassador in all sorts of af- 
 fairs. On one of these occasions the Nawaub's envoy 
 must have been in an exceeding ill-humour; for he 
 crushed Clavering's letter in his hand, and said with his 
 own particular manner and emphasis: 
 
 " A hundred be hanged. I'll have no more letters nor 
 no more shilly-shally. Tell Clavering I'll have a thou- 
 sand, or by Jove I'll split, and burst him all to atoms. 
 Let him give me a thousand and I'll go abroad, and I 
 give you my honour as a gentleman, I'll not ask him for 
 no more for a year. Give him that message from me, 
 Strong, my boy; and tell him if the money ain't here 
 next Friday at 12 o'clock, as sure as my name's what it 
 is, I'll have a paragraph in the newspaper on Saturday, 
 and next week I'll blow up the whole concern." 
 
 Strong carried back these words to his principal, on 
 whom their effect was such that actually on the day and 
 hour appointed, the Chevalier made his appearance once 
 more at Altamont's hotel at Baymouth, with the sum of 
 money required. Altamont was a gentleman, he said, 
 and behaved as such ; he paid his bill at the Inn, and the 
 Baymouth paper announced his departure on a foreign 
 tour. Strong saw him embark at Dover. " It must be 
 forgery at the very least," he thought, " that has put 
 Clavering into this fellow's power, and the Colonel has 
 got the bill." 
 
 Before the year was out, however, this happy country 
 saw the Colonel once more upon its shores. A con- 
 founded run on the red had finished him, he said, at
 
 596 PENDENNIS 
 
 Baden Baden: no gentleman could stand against a col- 
 our coming up fourteen times. He had been obliged to 
 draw upon Sir Francis Clavering for means of return- 
 ing home: and Clavering, though pressed for money 
 (for he had election expenses, had set up his establish- 
 ment in the country, and was engaged in furnishing his 
 London house), yet found means to accept Colonel Al- 
 tamont's bill, though evidently very much against his 
 will; for in Strong's hearing, Sir Francis wished to 
 heaven, with many curses, that the Colonel could have 
 been locked up in a debtor's gaol in Germany for life, so 
 that he might never be troubled again. 
 
 These sums for the Colonel Sir Francis was obliged to 
 raise without the knowledge of his wife ; for though per- 
 fectly liberal, nay, sumptuous in her expenditure, the 
 good lady had inherited a tolerable aptitude for business 
 along with the large fortune of her father, Snell, and 
 gave to her husband only such a handsome allowance as 
 she thought befitted a gentleman of his rank. Now and 
 again she would give him a present, or pay an outstand- 
 ing gambling debt; but she always exacted a pretty ac- 
 curate account of the moneys so required; and respect- 
 ing the subsidies to the Colonel, Clavering fairly told 
 Strong that he couldn't speak to his wife. 
 
 Part of Mr. Strong's business in life was to procure 
 this money and other sums, for his patron. And in the 
 Chevalier's apartments, in Shepherd's Inn, many nego- 
 tiations took place between gentlemen of the moneyed 
 world and Sir Francis Clavering; and many valuable 
 bank-notes and pieces of stamped paper were passed 
 between them. When a man has been in the habit of 
 getting in debt from his early youth, and of exchanging 
 his promises to pay at twelve months against present
 
 PENDENNIS 597 
 
 sums of money, it would seem as if no piece of good for- 
 tune ever permanently benefited him : a little while after 
 the advent of prosperity, the money-lender is pretty 
 certain to be in the house again, and the bills with the old 
 signature in the market. Clavering found it more con- 
 venient to see these gentry at Strong's lodgings than at 
 his own ; and such was the Chevalier's friendship for the 
 Baronet, that although he did not possess a shilling of 
 his own, his name might be seen as the drawer of almost 
 all the bills of exchange which Sir Francis Clavering ac- 
 cepted. Having drawn Clavering's bills, he got them 
 discounted " in the City." When they became due he 
 parleyed with the bill-holders, and gave them instal- 
 ments of their debt, or got time in exchange for fresh 
 acceptances. Regularly or irregularly, gentlemen must 
 live somehow : and as we read how, the other day, at Co- 
 morn, the troops forming that garrison were gay and 
 lively, acted plays, danced at balls, and consumed their 
 rations; though menaced with an assault from the 
 enemy without the walls, and with a gallows if the Aus- 
 trians were successful. so there are hundreds of gallant 
 spirits in this town, walking about in good spirits, din- 
 ing very day in tolerable gaiety and plenty, and going to 
 sleep comfortably; with a bailiff always more or less 
 near, and a rope of debt round their necks the which 
 trifling inconveniences, Ned Strong, the old soldier, bore 
 very easily. 
 
 But we shall have another opportunity of making ac- 
 quaintance with these and some other interesting inhabi- 
 tants of Shepherd's Inn, and in the meanwhile are keep- 
 ing Lady Clavering and her friends too long waiting 
 on the door steps of Grosvenor Place. 
 
 First they went into the gorgeous dining-room, fitted
 
 598 PENDENNIS 
 
 up, Lady Clavering couldn't for goodness gracious tell 
 why, in the middle-aged style, " unless," said her good- 
 natured ladyship, laughing, " because me and Clavering 
 are middle-aged people; " and here they were offered 
 the copious remains of the luncheon of which Lady Clav- 
 ering and Blanche had just partaken. When nobody 
 was near, our little Sylphide, who scarcely ate at din- 
 ner more than the six grains of rice of Amina, the friend 
 of the Ghouls in the Arabian Nights, was most active 
 with her knife and fork, and consumed a very substan- 
 tial portion of mutton cutlets: in which piece of hypoc- 
 risy it is believed she resembled other young ladies of 
 fashion. Pen and his uncle declined the refection, but 
 they admired the dining-room with fitting compliments, 
 and pronounced it " very chaste," that being the proper 
 phrase. There were, indeed, high-backed Dutch chairs 
 of the seventeenth century; there was a sculptured 
 carved buffet of the sixteenth; there was a sideboard 
 robbed out of the carved work of a church in the Low 
 Countries, and a large brass cathedral lamp over the 
 round oak table; there were old family portraits from 
 Wardour Street, and tapestry from France, bits of ar- 
 mour, double-handed swords and battle-axes made of 
 carton-pierre, looking-glasses, statuettes of saints, and 
 Dresden china nothing, in a word, could be chaster. 
 Behind the dining-room was the library, fitted with 
 busts and books all of a size, and wonderful easy chairs, 
 and solemn bronzes in the severe classic style. Here it 
 was that, guarded by double doors, Sir Francis smoked 
 cigars, and read " Bell's Life in London," and went to 
 sleep after dinner, when he was not smoking over the 
 billiard-table at his clubs, or punting at the gambling- 
 houses in Saint James's.
 
 PENDENNIS 599 
 
 But what could equal the chaste splendour of the 
 drawing-rooms? the carpets were so magnificently 
 fluffy that your foot made no more noise on them than 
 your shadow: on their white ground bloomed roses and 
 tulips as big as warming-pans : about the room were high 
 chairs and low chairs, bandy-legged chairs, chairs so at- 
 tenuated that it was a wonder any but a sylph could sit 
 upon them, marqueterie-tables covered with marvellous 
 gimcracks, china ornaments of all ages and countries, 
 bronzes, gilt daggers, Books of Beauty, yataghans, 
 Turkish papooshes and boxes of Parisian bonbons. 
 Wherever you sate down there were Dresden shepherds 
 and shepherdesses convenient at your elbow; there were 
 moreover, light blue poodles and ducks and cocks and 
 hens in porcelain; there were nymphs by Boucher, and 
 shepherdesses by Greuze, very chaste indeed ; there were 
 muslin curtains and brocade curtains, gilt cages with 
 parroquets and love birds, two squealing cockatoos, each 
 out-squealing and out-chattering the other ; a clock sing- 
 ing tunes on a console-table, and another booming the 
 hours like Great Tom, on the mantel-piece there was, 
 in a word, everything that comfort could desire, and the 
 most elegant taste devise. A London drawing-room, 
 fitted up without regard to expense, is surely one of the 
 noblest and most curious sights of the present day. The 
 Romans of the Lower Empire, the dear Marchionesses 
 and Countesses of Louis XV., could scarcely have had 
 a finer taste than our modern folks exhibit; and every 
 body who saw Lady Clavering's reception-rooms, was 
 forced to confess that they were most elegant ; and that 
 the prettiest rooms in London Lady Harley Quin's, 
 Lady Hanway Wardour's, or Mrs. Hodge-Podgson's 
 own, the great Railroad Croesus' wife, were not fitted 
 up with a more consummate " chastity."
 
 600 PENDENNIS 
 
 Poor Lady Clavering, meanwhile, knew little regard- 
 ing these things, and had a sad want of respect for the 
 splendours around her. " I only know they cost a pre- 
 cious deal of money, Major," she said to her guest, " and 
 that I don't advise you to try one of them gossamer gilt 
 chairs: 7 came down on one the night we gave our sec- 
 ond dinner party. Why didn't you come and see us 
 before? We'd have asked you to it." 
 
 ' You would have liked to see Mamma break a chair, 
 wouldn't you, Mr. Pendennis? " dear Blanche said with 
 a sneer. She was angry because Pen was talking and 
 laughing with Mamma, because Mamma had made a 
 number of blunders in describing the house for a hun- 
 dred other good reasons. 
 
 " I should like to have been by to give Lady Clavering 
 my arm if she had need of it," Pen answered, with a bow 
 and a blush. 
 
 " Quel preux Chevalier! " cried the Sylphide, tossing 
 up her little head. 
 
 " I have a fellow-feeling with those who fall, remem- 
 ber," Pen said. " I suffered myself very much from 
 doing so once." 
 
 " And you went home to Laura to console you," said 
 Miss Amory. Pen winced. He did not like the remem- 
 brance of the consolation which Laura had given to him, 
 nor was he very well pleased to find that his rebuff in 
 that quarter was known to the world: so as he had no- 
 thing to say in reply, he began to be immensely inter- 
 ested in the furniture round about him, and to praise 
 Lady Clavering's taste with all his might. 
 
 " Me, don't praise me," said honest Lady Clavering, 
 " it's all the upholsterer's doings and Captain Strong's ; 
 they did it all while we was at the Park and and 
 Lady Rockminster has been here and says the salongs
 
 PENDENNIS 601 
 
 are very well," said Lady Clavering, with an air and 
 tone of great deference. 
 
 " My cousin Laura has been staying with her,'* Pen 
 said. 
 
 " It's not the dowager: it is the Lady Rockminster." 
 
 "Indeed!" cried Major Pendennis, when he heard 
 this great name of fashion. " If you have her ladyship's 
 approval, Lady Clavering, you cannot be far wrong. 
 No, no, you cannot be far wrong. Lady Rockminster, 
 I should say, Arthur, is the very centre of the circle of 
 fashion and taste. The rooms are beautiful indeed ! " 
 and the Major's voice hushed as he spoke of this great 
 lady, and he looked round and surveyed the apartments 
 awfully and respectfully, as if he had been at church. 
 
 " Yes, Lady Rockminster has took us up," said Lady 
 Clavering. 
 
 " Taken us up, Mamma," cried Blanche, in a shrill 
 voice. 
 
 " Well, taken us up, then," said my lady, " it's very 
 kind of her, and I dare say we shall like it when we git 
 used to it, only at first one don't fancy being took well, 
 taken up, at all. She is going to give our balls for us; 
 and wants to invite all our diners. But I won't stand 
 that. I will have my old friends and I won't let her 
 send all the cards out, and sit mum at the head of my 
 own table. You must come to me, Arthur and Major- 
 come, let me see, on the 14th. It ain't one of our grand 
 dinners, Blanche," she said, looking round at her daugh- 
 ter, who bit her lips and frowned very savagely for a 
 sylphide. 
 
 The Major, with a smile and a bow, said he would 
 much rather come to a quiet meeting than to a grand 
 dinner. He had had enough of those large enter-
 
 602 PENDENNIS 
 
 tainments, and preferred the simplicity of the home 
 circle. 
 
 " I always think a dinner's the best the second day," 
 said Lady Clavering, thinking to mend her first speech. 
 "On the 14th we'll be quite a snug little party;" at 
 which second blunder, Miss Blanche clasped her hands 
 in despair, and said " O, Mamma, vous etes incorrigible" 
 Major Pendennis vowed that he liked snug dinners of 
 all things in the world, and confounded her ladyship's 
 impudence for daring to ask such a man as him to a sec- 
 ond day's dinner. But he was a man of an economical 
 turn of mind, and bethinking himself that he could 
 throw over these people if anything better should offer, 
 he accepted with the blandest air. As for Pen, he was 
 not a diner-out of thirty years' standing as yet, and the 
 idea of a fine feast in a fine house was still perfectly 
 welcome to him. 
 
 ' What was that pretty little quarrel which engaged 
 itself between your worship and Miss Amory? " the 
 Major asked of Pen, as they walked away together. " I 
 thought you used to be au mieux in that quarter." 
 
 ; ' Used to be," answered Pen, with a dandified air, " is 
 a vague phrase regarding a woman. Was and is are 
 two very different terms, sir, as regards women's hearts 
 especially." 
 
 " Egad, they change as we do," cried the elder. 
 ' When we took the Cape of Good Hope, I recollect 
 there was a lady who talked of poisoning herself for 
 your humble servant; and, begad, in three months, she 
 ran away from her husband with somebody else. Don't 
 get yourself entangled with that Miss Amory. She is 
 forward, affected, and underbred; and her character is 
 somewhat never mind what. But don't think of her;
 
 PENDENNIS 603 
 
 ten thousand pound won't do for you. What, my good 
 fellow, is ten thousand pound? I would scarcely pay 
 that girl's milliner's bill with the interest of the money." 
 ' You seem to be a connoisseur in millinery. Uncle," 
 Pen said. 
 
 " I was, sir, I was," replied the senior; " and the old 
 war-horse, you know, never hears the sound of a trum- 
 pet, but he begins to he, he! you understand," and he 
 gave a killing though somewhat superannuated leer and 
 bow to a carriage that passed them and entered the Park. 
 
 " Lady Catherine Martingale's carriage," he said, 
 " mons'ous fine girls the daughters, though, gad, I re- 
 member their mother a thousand times handsomer. No, 
 Arthur, my dear fellow, with your person and expecta- 
 tions, you ought to make a good coup in marriage some 
 day or other; and though I wouldn't have this repeated 
 at Fairoaks, you rogue, ha! ha! a reputation for a little 
 wickedness, and for being an homme dangereux, don't 
 hurt a young fellow with the women. They like it, sir 
 they hate a milksop . . . young men must be young 
 men, you know. But for marriage," continued the 
 veteran moralist, " that is a very different matter. 
 Marry a woman with money. I've told you before it is 
 as easy to get a rich wife as a poor one ; and a doosed deal 
 more comfortable to sit down to a well-cooked dinner, 
 with your little entrees nicely served, than to have no- 
 thing but a damned cold leg of mutton between you and 
 your wife. We shall have a good dinner on the 1-itli, 
 when we dine with Sir Francis Clavering : stick to that, 
 my boy, in your relations with the family. Cultivate 
 'em, but keep 'em for dining. No more of your youthful 
 follies and nonsense about love in a cottage." 
 
 " It must be a cottage with a clouble coach-house, a
 
 604 PENDENNIS 
 
 cottage of gentility, sir," said Pen, quoting the hack- 
 neyed ballad of the Devil's Walk: but his uncle did not 
 know that poem (though, perhaps, he might be leading 
 Pen upon the very promenade in question) , and went on 
 with his philosophical remarks, very much pleased with 
 the aptness of the pupil to whom he addressed them. 
 Indeed Arthur Pendennis was a clever fellow, who took 
 his colour very readily from his neighbour and found 
 the adaptation only too easy. 
 
 Warrington, the grumbler, growled out that Pen was 
 becoming such a puppy that soon there would be no 
 bearing him. But the truth is, the young man's success 
 and dashing manners pleased his elder companion. He 
 liked to see Pen gay and spirited, and brimful of health, 
 and life, and hope ; as a man who has long since left off 
 being amused with clown and harlequin, still gets a 
 pleasure in watching a child at a pantomime. Mr. Pen's 
 former sulkiness disappeared with his better fortune: 
 and he bloomed as the sun began to shine upon him.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII 
 
 IN WHICH COLONEL ALTAMONT APPEARS AND 
 DISAPPEARS 
 
 the day appointed, 
 Major Pendennis, 
 who had formed 
 no better engage- 
 ment, and Ar- 
 thur, who desir- 
 ed none, arrived 
 together to dine 
 with Sir Francis 
 Clavering. The 
 only tenants of 
 the drawing- 
 room when Pen 
 and his uncle 
 reached it, were 
 Sir Francis and 
 his wife, and our 
 friend Captain 
 Strong, whom 
 Arthur was very 
 glad to see, though the Major looked very sulkily at 
 Strong, being by no means well pleased to sit down to 
 dinner with Clavering's d house-steward, as he irrev- 
 erently called Strong. But Mr. Welbore Welbore, 
 Clavering's country neighbour and brother member of 
 
 605
 
 606 PENDENNIS 
 
 Parliament, speedily arriving, Pendennis the elder was 
 somewhat appeased, for Welbore, though perfectly dull, 
 and taking no more part in the conversation at dinner 
 than the footman behind his chair, was a respectable 
 country gentleman of ancient family and seven thousand 
 a year; and the Major felt always at ease in such society. 
 To these were added other persons of note : the Dowager 
 Lady Rockminster, who had her reasons for being well 
 with the Clavering family, and the Lady Agnes Foker, 
 with her son Mr. Harry, our old acquaintance. Mr. 
 Pynsent could not come, his parliamentary duties keep- 
 ing him at the House, duties which sate upon the two 
 other senators very lightly. Miss Blanche Amory was 
 the last of the company who made her appearance. 
 She was dressed in a killing white silk dress, which dis- 
 played her pearly shoulders to the utmost advantage. 
 Foker whispered to Pen, who regarded her with eyes of 
 evident admiration, that he considered her " a stunner." 
 She chose to be very gracious to Arthur upon this day, 
 and held out her hand most cordially, and talked about 
 dear Fairoaks, and asked for dear Laura and his mother, 
 and said she was longing to go back to the country, and 
 in fact was entirely simple, affectionate, and artless. 
 
 Harry Foker thought he had never seen anybody so 
 amiable and delightful. Not accustomed much to the 
 society of ladies, and ordinarily being dumb in their 
 presence, he found that he could speak before Miss 
 Amory, and became uncommonly lively and talkative, 
 even before the dinner was announced and the party 
 descended to the lower rooms. He would have longed 
 to give his arm to the fair Blanche, and conduct her 
 down the broad carpeted stair ; but she fell to the lot of 
 Pen upon this occasion, Mr. Foker being appointed to
 
 PENDENNIS 607 
 
 escort Mrs. Welbore Welbore, in consequence of his su- 
 perior rank as an earl's grandson. 
 
 But though he was separated from the object of his 
 desire during the passage down stairs, the delighted 
 Foker found himself by Miss Amory's side at the din- 
 ner-table, and flattered himself that he had manoeuvred 
 very well in securing that happy place. It may be that 
 the move was not his, but that it was made by another 
 person. Blanche had thus the two young men, one on 
 each side of her, and each tried to render himself gallant 
 and agreeable. 
 
 Foker's mamma, from her place, surveying her dar- 
 ling boy, was surprised at his vivacity. Harry talked 
 constantly to his fair neighbour about the topics of 
 the day. 
 
 " Seen Taglioni in the Sylphide, Miss Amory? Bring 
 me that souprame of Volile again, if you please (this 
 was addressed to the attendant near him), very good: 
 can't think where the souprames come from; what be- 
 comes of the legs of the fowls, I wonder? She's clip- 
 ping in the Sylphide, ain't she? " and he began very 
 kindly to hum the pretty air which pervades that pret- 
 tiest of all ballets, now faded into the past with that most 
 beautiful and gracious of all dancers. Will the young 
 folks ever see anything so charming, anything so classic, 
 anything like Taglioni? 
 
 " Miss Amory is a sylph herself," said Mr. Pen. 
 
 "What a delightful tenor voice you have, Mr. Foker," 
 said the young lady. " I am sure you have been well 
 taught. I sing a little myself. I should like to sing with 
 you." 
 
 Pen remembered that words very similar had been ad- 
 dressed to himself by the young lady, and that she had
 
 G08 PENDENNIS 
 
 liked to sing with him in former days. And sneering 
 within himself, he wondered with how many other gen- 
 tlemen she had sung duets since his time? But he did 
 not think fit to put this awkward question aloud: and 
 only said, with the very tenderest air which he could as- 
 sume, " I should like to hear you sing again, Miss 
 Blanche. I never heard a voice I liked so well as yours, 
 I think." 
 
 " I thought you liked Laura's," said Miss Blanche. 
 
 " Laura's is a contralto: and that voice is very often 
 out, you know," Pen said, bitterly. " I have heard a 
 great deal of music, in London," he continued. ' I'm 
 tired of those professional people they sing too loud 
 or I have grown too old or too blase. One grows old 
 very soon, in London, Miss Amory. And like all old 
 fellows, I only care for the songs I heard in my youth." 
 
 " I like English music best. I don't care for foreign 
 songs much. Get me some saddle of mutton," said Mr. 
 Foker. 
 
 " I adore English ballads of all things," said Miss 
 Amory. 
 
 " Sing me one of the old songs after dinner, will 
 you?" said Pen, with an imploring voice. 
 
 " Shall I sing you an English song, after dinner? " 
 asked the Sylphide, turning to Mr. Foker. " I will, if 
 you will promise to come up soon : " and she gave him a 
 perfect broadside of her eyes. 
 
 " Fit come up after dinner, fast enough," he said sim- 
 ply. " I don't care about much wine afterwards I take 
 my whack at dinner I mean my share, you know; and 
 when I have had as much as I want, I toddle up to tea. 
 I'm a domestic character, Miss Amory my habits are 
 simple and when I'm pleased I'm generally in a good
 
 PENDENNIS 60S 
 
 humour, ain't I, Pen? that jelly, if you please not 
 that one, the other with the cherries inside. How the 
 doose do they get those cherries inside the jellies? " In 
 this way the artless youth prattled on : and Miss Amory 
 listened to him with inexhaustible good humour. When 
 the ladies took their departure for the upper regions, 
 Blanche made the two young men promise faithfully to 
 quit the table soon, and departed with kind glances to 
 each. She dropped her gloves on Foker's side of the 
 table, and her handkerchief on Pen's. Each had some 
 little attention paid to him ; her politeness to Mr. Foker 
 was perhaps a little more encouraging than her kindness 
 to Arthur : but the benevolent little creature did her best 
 to make both the gentlemen happy. Foker caught her 
 last glance as she rushed out of the door ; that bright look 
 passed over Mr. Strong's broad white waistcoat, and shot 
 straight at Harry Foker's. The door closed on the 
 charmer: he sate down with a sigh, and swallowed a 
 bumper of claret. 
 
 As the dinner at which Pen and his uncle took their 
 places was not one of our grand parties, it had been 
 served at a considerably earlier hour than those ceremo- 
 nial banquets of the London season, which custom has 
 ordained shall scarcely take place before nine o'clock; 
 and the company being small, and Miss Blanche, anx- 
 ious to betake herself to her piano in the drawing-room, 
 giving constant hints to her mother to retreat, Lady 
 Clavering made that signal very speedily, so that it was 
 quite daylight yet when the ladies reached the upper 
 apartments, from the flower-embroidered balconies of 
 which they could command a view of the two Parks, of 
 the poor couples and children still sauntering in the one,
 
 610 PENDENNIS 
 
 and of the equipages of ladies and the horses of dandies 
 passing through the arch of the other. The sun, in a 
 word, had not set behind the elms of Kensington Gar- 
 dens, and was still gilding the statue erected by the ladies 
 of England in honour of his Grace the Duke of Wel- 
 lington, when Lady Clavering and her female friends 
 left the gentlemen drinking wine. 
 
 The windows of the dining-room were opened to let 
 in the fresh air, and afforded to the passers-by in the 
 street a pleasant or, perhaps, tantalising view of six gen- 
 tlemen in white waistcoats, with a quantity of decanters 
 and a variety of fruits before them little boys, as they 
 passed and jumped up at the area railings, and took a 
 peep, said to one another, " Mi hi, Jim, shouldn't you 
 like to be there, and have a cut of that there pine- 
 apple? " the horses and carriages of the nobility and 
 gentry passed by, conveying them to Belgravian toilets : 
 the policeman, with clamping feet, patrolled up and 
 down before the mansion: the shades of evening began 
 to fall: the gasman came and lighted the lamps before 
 Sir Francis's door: the butler entered the dining-room, 
 and illuminated the antique Gothic chandelier over the 
 antique carved oak dining-table : so that from outside 
 the house you looked inwards upon a night scene of 
 feasting and wax candles; and from within you beheld 
 a vision of a calm summer evening, and the wall of Saint 
 James's Park, and the sky above, in which a star or two 
 was just beginning to twinkle. 
 
 Jeames, with folded legs, leaning against the door- 
 pillar of his master's abode, looked forth musingly upon 
 the latter tranquil sight: whilst a spectator, clinging to 
 the railings, examined the former scene. Policeman 
 X, passing, gave his attention to neither, but fixed it
 
 PENDENNIS 611 
 
 upon the individual holding by the railings, and gazing 
 into Sir Francis Clavering's dining-room, where Strong 
 was laughing and talking away, making the conversa- 
 tion for the party. 
 
 The man at the railings was very gorgeously attired 
 with chains, jewellery, and waistcoats, which the illu- 
 mination from the house lighted up to great advantage ; 
 his boots were shiny ; he had brass buttons to his coat, and 
 large white wristbands over his knuckles; and indeed 
 looked so grand, that X imagined he beheld a member of 
 parliament, or a person of consideration before him. 
 Whatever his rank, however, the M.P., or person of con- 
 sideration, was considerably excited by wine; for he 
 lurched and reeled somewhat in his gait, and his hat was 
 cocked over his wild and blood-shot eyes in a manner 
 which no sober hat ever could assume. His copious black 
 hair was evidently surreptitious, and his whiskers of the 
 Tyrian purple. 
 
 As Strong's laughter, following after one of his own 
 gros mots, came ringing out of window, this gentleman 
 without laughed and sniggered in the queerest way like- 
 wise, and he slapped his thigh and winked at Jeames 
 pensive in the portico, as much as to say, " Plush, my 
 boy, isn't that a good story? " 
 
 Jeames's attention had been gradually drawn from 
 the moon in the heavens to this sublunary scene ; and he 
 was puzzled and alarmed by the appearance of the man 
 in shiny boots. " A holtercation," he remarked, after- 
 wards, in the servants'-hall a " holtercation with a fel- 
 ler in the streets is never no good; and indeed, he was 
 not hired for any such purpose." So, having surveyed 
 the man for some time, who went on laughing, reeling, 
 nodding his head with tipsy knowingness, Jeames
 
 612 PENDENNIS 
 
 looked out of the portico, and softly called " Pleace- 
 man," and beckoned to that officer. 
 
 X marched up resolute, with one Berlin glove stuck 
 in his beltside, and Jeames simply pointed with his in- 
 dex finger to the individual who was laughing against 
 the railings. Not one single word more than " Pleace- 
 man," did he say, but stood there in the calm summer 
 evening, pointing calmly : a grand sight. 
 
 X advanced to the individual and said, " Now, sir, will 
 you have the kindness to move hon? " 
 
 The individual, who was in perfect good humour, did 
 not appear to hear one word which Policeman X uttered, 
 but nodded and waggled his grinning head at Strong, 
 until his hat almost fell from his head over the area rail- 
 ings. 
 
 " Now, sir, move on, do you hear? " cries X, in a much 
 more peremptory tone, and he touched the stranger 
 gently with one of the fingers inclosed in the gauntlets 
 of the Berlin woof. 
 
 He of the many rings instantly started, or rather 
 staggered back, into what is called an attitude of self- 
 defence, and in that position began the operation which 
 is entitled " squaring," at Policeman X, and showed 
 himself brave and warlike, if unsteady. " Hullo! keep 
 your hands off a gentleman," he said, with an oath which 
 need not be repeated. 
 
 " Move on out of this," said X, " and don't be a block- 
 ing up the pavement, staring into gentlemen's dining- 
 rooms." 
 
 " Not stare ho, ho, not stare that is a good one," 
 replied the other, with a satiric laugh and sneer. 
 ' Who's to prevent me from staring, looking at my 
 friends, if I like? not you, old highlows."
 
 Colonel Altamont refuses 
 to move on
 
 PENDENNIS 618 
 
 " Friends ! I dessay. Move on," answered X. 
 
 " If you touch me, I'll pitch into you, I will," roared 
 the other. " I tell you I know 'em all That's Sir Fran- 
 cis Clavering, Baronet, M.P. I know him, and he 
 knows me and that's Strong, and that's the young chap 
 that made the row at the ball. I say, Strong, Strong! " 
 
 " It's that d Altamont," cried Sir Francis within, 
 
 with a start and a guilty look; and Strong also, with a 
 look of annoyance, got up from the table, and ran out 
 to the intruder. 
 
 A gentleman in a white waistcoat, running out from 
 a dining-room bare-headed, a policeman, and an indi- 
 vidual decently attired, engaged in almost fistycuffs on 
 the pavement, were enough to make a crowd, even in 
 that quiet neighbourhood, at half -past eight o'clock in 
 the evening, and a small mob began to assemble before 
 Sir Francis Clavering's door. " For God's sake, come 
 in," Strong said, seizing his acquaintance's arm. " Send 
 for a cab, James, if you please," he added in an under 
 voice to that domestic; and carrying the excited gentle- 
 man out of the street, the outer door was closed upon 
 him, and the small crowd began to move away. 
 
 Mr. Strong had intended to convey the stranger into 
 Sir Francis's private sitting-room, where the hats of the 
 male guests were awaiting them, and having there 
 soothed his friend by bland conversation, to have carried 
 him off as soon as the cab arrived but the new comer 
 was in a great state of wrath at the indignity which had 
 been put upon him; and when Strong would have led 
 him into the second door, said in a tipsy voice, " That 
 ain't the door that's the dining-room door where the 
 drink's going on and I'll go and have some, by Jove; 
 I'll go and have some." At this audacity the butler
 
 614 PENDENNIS 
 
 stood aghast in the hall, and placed himself before the 
 door: but it opened behind him, and the master of the 
 house made his appearance, with anxious looks. 
 
 " I Ml have some, by I will," the intruder was 
 
 roaring out, as Sir Francis came forward. " Hullo! 
 Clavering, I say I'm come to have some wine with you; 
 hay! old boy hay, old corkscrew? Get us a bottle of 
 the yellow seal, you old thief the very best a hundred 
 rupees a dozen, and no mistake." 
 
 The host reflected a moment over his company. 
 There is only Welbore, Pendennis, and those two lads, 
 he thought and with a forced laugh and piteous look, 
 he said, " Well, Altamont, come in. I am very glad 
 to see you, I'm sure." 
 
 Colonel Altamont, for the intelligent reader has 
 doubtless long ere this discovered in the stranger His 
 Excellency the Ambassador of the Nawaub of Luck- 
 now, reeled into the dining-room, with a triumphant 
 look towards Jeames, the footman, which seemed to say, 
 ' There, sir, what do you think of that? Now, am I a 
 gentleman or no? " and sank down into the first vacant 
 chair. Sir Francis Clavering timidly stammered out the 
 Colonel's name to his guest Mr. Welbore Welbore, and 
 his Excellency began drinking wine forthwith and gaz- 
 ing round upon the company, now with the most won- 
 derful frowns, and anon with the blandest smiles, and 
 hiccupped remarks encomiastic of the drink which he 
 was imbibing. 
 
 ' Very singular man. Has resided long in a native 
 
 court in India," Strong said, with great gravity, the 
 
 Chevalier's presence of mind never deserting him " in 
 
 those Indian courts they get very singular habits." 
 
 ' Very," said Major Pendennis, drily, and wondering
 
 PENDENNIS 615 
 
 what in goodness' name was the company into which he 
 had got. 
 
 Mr. Foker was pleased with the new comer. " It's 
 the man who would sing the Malay song at the Back 
 Kitchen," he whispered to Pen. ' Try this pine, sir," 
 he then said to Colonel Altamont, " it's uncommonly 
 fine." 
 
 " Pines I've seen 'em feed pigs on pines," said the 
 Colonel. 
 
 " All the Nawaub of Lucknow's pigs are fed on 
 pines," Strong whispered to Major Pendennis. 
 
 " O, of course," the Major answered. Sir Francis 
 Clavering was, in the meanwhile, endeavouring to make 
 an excuse to his brother guest, for the new comer's con- 
 dition, and muttered something regarding Altamont, 
 that he was an extraordinary character, very eccentric, 
 very had Indian habits didn't understand the rules of 
 English society; to which old Welbore, a shrewd old 
 gentleman, who drank his wine with great regularity, 
 said, " that seemed pretty clear." 
 
 Then, the Colonel seeing Pen's honest face, regarded 
 it for a while with as much steadiness as became his 
 condition; and said, " I know you, too, young fellow. I 
 remember you. Baymouth ball, by jingo. Wanted to 
 fight the Frenchman. I remember you ; " and he 
 laughed, and he squared with his fists, and seemed 
 hugely amused in the drunken depths of his mind, as 
 these recollections passed, or, rather, reeled across it. 
 
 " Mr. Pendennis, you remember Colonel Altamont, 
 at Baymouth? " Strong said: upon which Pen, bowing 
 rather stiffly, said, " he had the pleasure of remembering 
 that circumstance perfectly." 
 
 "What's his name?" cried the Colonel. Strong 
 named Mr. Pendennis again.
 
 610 PENDENNIS 
 
 " Pendennis! Pendennis be hanged 1" Altamont 
 roared out to the surprise of every one, and thumping 
 with his fist on the table. 
 
 " My name is also Pendennis, sir," said the Major, 
 whose dignity was exceedingly mortified by the even- 
 ing's events that he, Major Pendennis, should have 
 been asked to such a party, and that a drunken man 
 should have been introduced to it. " My name is Pen- 
 dennis, and I will be obliged to you not to curse it too 
 loudly." 
 
 The tipsy man turned round to look at him, and as he 
 looked, it appeared as if Colonel Altamont suddenly 
 grew sober. He put his hand across his forehead, and 
 in doing so, displaced somewhat the black wig which he 
 wore; and his eyes stared fiercely at the Major, who, in 
 his turn, like a resolute old warrior as he was, looked at 
 his opponent very keenly and steadily. At the end of 
 the mutual inspection, Altamont began to button up his 
 brass-buttoned coat, and rising up from his chair, sud- 
 denly, and to the company's astonishment, reeled to- 
 wards the door, and issued from it, followed by Strong: 
 all that the latter heard him utter was " Captain Beak! 
 Captain Beak, by jingo! " 
 
 There had not passed above a quarter of an hour from 
 his strange appearance to his equally sudden departure. 
 The two young men and the Baronet's other guest won- 
 dered at the scene, and could find no explanation for it. 
 Clavering seemed exceedingly pale and agitated, and 
 turned with looks of almost terror towards Major Pen- 
 dennis. The latter had been eyeing his host keenly for 
 a minute or two. " Do you know him? " asked Sir 
 Francis of the Major. 
 
 " I am sure I have seen the fellow," the Major replied, 
 looking as if he, too, was puzzled. " Yes, I have it. He
 
 PENDENNIS 617 
 
 was a deserter from the Horse Artillery, who got into 
 the Nawaub's service. I remember his face quite well." 
 
 "Oh!" said Clavering, with a sigh which indicated 
 immense relief of mind, and the Major looked at him 
 with a twinkle of his sharp old eyes. The cab which 
 Strong had desired to be called, drove away with the 
 Chevalier and Colonel Altamont ; coffee was brought to 
 the remaining gentlemen, and they went up stairs to 
 the ladies in the drawing-room, Foker declaring con- 
 fidentially to Pen that " this was the rummest go he ever 
 saw," which decision, Pen said, laughing, " showed great 
 discrimination on Mr. Foker's part." 
 
 Then, according to her promise, Miss Amory made 
 music for the young men. Foker was enraptured with 
 her performance, and kindly joined in the airs which 
 she sang, when he happened to be acquainted with them. 
 Pen affected to talk aside with others of the party, but 
 Blanche brought him quickly to the piano, by singing 
 some of his own words, those which we have given in a 
 previous number, indeed, and which the Sylphide had 
 herself, she said, set to music. I don't know whether the 
 air was hers, or how much of it was arranged for her by 
 Signer Twankidillo, from whom she took lessons: but 
 good or bad, original or otherwise, it delighted Mr. Pen, 
 who remained by her side, and turned the leaves now for 
 her most assiduously " Gad ! how I wish I could write 
 verses like you, Pen," Foker sighed afterwards to his 
 companion. " If I could do 'em, wouldn't I, that's all? 
 But I never was a dab at writing, you see, and I'm sorry 
 I was so idle when I was at school." 
 
 No mention was made before the ladies of the curious 
 little scene which had been transacted below stairs; al- 
 though Pen was just on the point of describing it to
 
 618 PENDENNIS 
 
 Miss Amory, when that young lady enquired for Cap- 
 tain Strong, who she wished should join her in a duet. 
 But chancing to look up towards Sir Francis Clavering, 
 Arthur saw a peculiar expression of alarm in the baro- 
 net's ordinarily vacuous face, and discreetly held his 
 tongue. It was rather a dull evening. Welbore went 
 to sleep, as he always did at music and after dinner: nor 
 did Major Pendennis entertain the ladies with copious 
 anecdotes and endless little scandalous stories, as his 
 wont was, but sate silent for the most part, and appeared 
 to be listening to the music, and watching the fair young 
 performer. 
 
 The hour of departure having arrived, the Major 
 rose, regretting that so delightful an evening m should 
 have passed away so quickly, and addressed a particu- 
 larly fine compliment to Miss Amory, upon her splendid 
 talents as a singer. ' Your daughter, Lady Clavering," 
 he said to that lady, " is a perfect nightingale a perfect 
 nightingale, begad! I have scarcely ever heard any- 
 thing equal to her, and her pronunciation of every lan- 
 guage begad, of every language seems to me to be 
 perfect ; and the best houses in London must open before 
 a young lady who has such talents, and, allow an old 
 fellow to say, Miss Amory, such a face." 
 
 Blanche was as much astonished by these compliments 
 as Pen was, to whom his uncle, a little time since, had 
 been speaking in very disparaging terms of the Sylph. 
 The Major and the two young men walked home to- 
 gether, after Mr.. Foker had placed his mother in her 
 carriage, and procured a light for an enormous cigar. 
 
 The young gentleman's company or his tobacco did 
 not appear to be agreeable to Major Pendennis, who 
 eyed him askance several times, and with a look which
 
 PENDENNIS 619 
 
 plainly indicated that he wished Mr. Foker would take 
 his leave ; but Foker hung on resolutely to the uncle and 
 nephew, even until they came to the former's door in 
 Bury Street, where the Major wished the lads good 
 night. 
 
 " And I say, Pen," he said in a confidential whisper, 
 calling his nephew back, " mind you make a point of 
 calling in Grosvenor Place to-morrow. They've been 
 uncommonly civil; mons'ously civil and kind." 
 
 Pen promised and wondered, and the Major's door 
 having been closed upon him by Morgan, Foker took 
 Pen's arm, and walked with him for some time silently 
 puffing his cigar. At last, when they had reached Char- 
 ing Cross on Arthur's way home to the Temple, Harry 
 Foker relieved himself, and broke out with that eulo- 
 gium upon poetry, and those regrets regarding a mis- 
 spent youth, which have just been mentioned. And all 
 the way along the Strand, and up to the door of Pen's 
 very staircase, in Lamb Court, Temple, young Harry 
 Foker did not cease to speak about singing and Blanche 
 Amory.
 
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