BON-MOTS CHARLES LAMB y DOUGLAS JERROLD GftOTESqUBS BV ^VBRET BEiLRDSLET ^ ( LIBRARY I UNIVERSITY OF I CALIFORNIA I SAN DIEGO J ^^^^^^^.K EX ILBf^IS IVELLIS^ f\OBEI\TS B O N - M O T S. 9 (S^uayiyU^ <:^Cc(y}yi^ ^^ — gr — ' " of a story I once ''I heard of an old I soldier who in '^ tI^ ' battle got shot in the calf of the leg, and the bullet got so embedded that the doctors could not extract it. Well, at first the fellow did not feel comfortable with his heavy companion, and had to grin and bear it ; but in illustration of the principle that use is second nature, in course of time he bega?t to like the lead." Douglas Jerrold. 97 COMEONE was describing a state funeral with all its pageantry — its ostrich feathers, genoa velvet, and magnificent coffin. " Humph !" exclaimed Jerrold, "how truly is it called lying in state." — v\/\/Vv— r\Y a certain class of charitable persons, Douglas Jerrold said, " Upon my word, they are so good they would pour rose-water over a toad. " ■pVERYBODY has imagination when money is the thought — the common brain will bubble to a golden wand. — vVVW — C PEAKING of fairy tales, Douglas Jerrold remarked that, ^' Nothing can be truer than fairy wisdom ; it is true as sunbeams." — WVW— T IVE in a palace without a petticoat — 'tis but a place to shiver in. WTiereas, take off the house-top, break every window, make the doors creak, the chimneys smoke, give free entry to sun, wind and rain— still will a petticoat make the hovel habitable, nay, bring the little house- hold gods crowding about the fireplace, G 98 Bon-Mots. "QOUGLAS JERROLD imagined the Apostles, in their old-world attire, enter- ing a London church, how the beadle, with a big look, would waive them from the pews and motion them down upon the benches. And Apostles would sit there, pitying the sleek pluralist in the pulpit, to whom even Jacob's ladder has its rungs encased with purple velvet to make the footing softer. TV/rONEY is the prose fairy of our mechanical generation. — WVW— " TDIGS were created," said Jerrold, " not to yield bacon for ploughmen, but for the higher purpose of supplying little pigs to parsons." — 'Af\/\/v— A REMARKABLY ugly and disagreeable man sat opposite Jerrold at a dinner- party. Before the cloth was removed Jerrold accidentally broke a glass. Whereupon the ugly gentleman, thinking to twit his opposite neighbour with great effect, said slily, "What, already, Jerrold! Now, I never break a glass. " "I wonder at that," was Jerrold's instant reply, ' ' you ought whenever you look in one, " loo Bon-Mots. THROWN was said by all his friends to be the toady of Jones. The appearance of Jones in a room was the proof that Brown was in the passage. When Jones had the influenza, Brown dutifully caught a cold in the head. Jerrold met Brown one day, and holding him by the buttonhole, said, ' ' Have you heard the rumour that 's flying about town ? " "No." "Well, they say Jones pays the dog-tax for you." — WVW— A N actor who had left his wife without any money in London, wrote glowing letters from America, but still no supplies. One of these letters was read aloud in the Green-Room of the Haymarket. " What kindness ! " exclaimed Jerrold, with strong emphasis. " Kindness ! " ejaculatedone of the actresses indignantly, "when he never sends the poor woman a penny." "Yes," replied Jerrold, "unremitting kind- ness ! " — ^/WV■^ — /^N a friend being laid up through sleeping in a damp bed, Jerrold remarked, " To think that two or three yards of damp flax should so knock down the majesty of man." Douglas Jerrold. loi A LADY one day spoke to Jerrold about the beauty of an infant. In the enthusiasm of her affection she said — " Really, I cannot find words to convey to you even a faint idea of its pretty ways." " I see," Jerrold replied, '' it's a child more easily conceived than described." /^NE of the members of the Hooks and Eyes Club was expatiating on the fact that he had dined three times at the Duke of Devon- shire's, and that on no occasion had there been any fish at table. "I cannot account for it," he added. "I can," said Jerrold, '' they ate it all up stairs." — A/^/SjV' — V\/'HATEVER promises a man may make before marriage, the licence is as a receipt in full. A RUMOUR had been very general that a certain hard lugubrious actor was labour- ing under an inflammation of the brain. A friend having mentioned the report to Jerrold, was reassured in the following words : " Depend upon it, there is not the least foioida- tion for the report. " Bon-Mots. T\R CHARLES MACKAY records that when everybody was at a loss to invent a name ^ for the great palace of glass built for the Exhi- bition of 185 1, and when, in default of any- thing better, it was commonly called "The Great Exhibition Build- ing in Hyde Park," Douglas Jerrold solved the difficulty by calling it "The Crystal Pal- ace." The name took the public fancy at once, and "Crystal Palace" it became ; and be- queathed its happy title to one great and many smaller successors in Europe and America. — vv\/Vj^- A CELEBRATED barrister— a friend with whom Jerrold loved to jest — entered a certain club-room where Jerrold and some friends were enjoying a cigar. The barrister was in an excited state, and exclaimed — " I have just met a scoundrelly barrister ! " Jerrold, interrupting him, said, "What a coincidence ! " Douglas Jerrold. 103 pHARLES DICKENS, after Jerrold' s death, frankly wrote : — Of his generosity I had a proof within these two or three years, which it saddens me to think of now. There had been an estrangement between us — not on any personal subject, and not involving an angry word — and a good many months had passed without my even seeing him in the street, when it fell out that we dined each with his own separate party in the Strangers' Room of a club. Our chairs were almost back to back, and I took mine after he was seated and at dinner. I said not a word (I am sorry to remember), and did not look that way. Before we had sat so long, he openly wheeled his chair round, stretched out both his hands in the most engaging manner, and said aloud, with a bright and loving face that I can see as I write to you, *' For God's sake, let us be friends again ! a life's not long enough for this." A DRAMATIC novice took a play which he had written to Douglas Jerrold, and asked his opinion of it. The play was very bad, and Jerrold hesitated. " Do you think it good?" anxiously queried the author. "Good?" repeated Jerrold, "good, dear boy? good is not the word." 104 Bon-Mots. " TS the legacy to be paid down on the nail?" somebody asked Jerrold, referring to a celebrated will case. "On the cofifin-nail," Jerrold replied. — aVW^ " VyELL, Talfourd," said Jerrold, on meet- ing the late eminent judge and author one day near Temple Bar, "have you any more Ions in the fire?" — aWw— T^HE author of an epic poem asked Jerrold if he had seen his Desce?it into Hell. "No," replied Jerrold, with a chuckle of delight, "but I should like to." -w\/\/Vv— JERROLD, Herbert Ingram, Peter Cunning- ham and Charles Mackay, were out for a day's ramble which took them to the little village of Chenies ; they visited the church or chapel, where many members of the ducal family of Bedford are buried. " If I were one of the Russells," said Cunning- ham, " I should not wish to come here often. I should not like to know the exact spot where I was to be buried." ' ' My feeling exactly," said Jerrold ; ' ' and for that reason I never enter Westminster Abbey." Douglas Jerrokl. 105 r^N the great success of Thomas d Becket at the Surrey Theatre a friend congratulating the author said — " Jerrold, you'll be the Surrey Shakespeare." "The sorry Shakespeare, you mean," was the quick retort. — t4\l\!\h' — AS an example of conservatism, Jerrold said he once met an acquaintance who was writhing and groaning, and, on his asking what was the mat- ter, the suf- ferer said — "Oh, my dear fellow, my cursed corns ! they torment me so ! " " Corns ! " echoed Jerrold, cut them ? " "Cut them? — what, the corns I've had for twenty years ? Cut them ! " why don't you — 'At\l\lv— /^F our system of government Jerrold said it is like an hour-glass : when one side 's quite run out, we turn up the other, and go on again. io6 Bon-Mots. ^NGUS B. REACH had been pertinaciously insisting at a dinner table that his name should be pronounced Re-ak and not as spelt. When the dessert came on Jerrold leant across and said, " If you please Mr Re-ak will you hand me z.pe-ak f " r\F Davidge, the grinding manager, Jerrold said, smarting under recent ill-use, " May he live to keep his carriage, and yet not be able to ride in it." —'Al\f\lM— "pVE ate the apple that she might dress. — j\l\/\i\r^ — JERROLD met a fop one day, who languidly offered him two fingers. Jerrold, not to be outdone, thrust forward a single finger, saying —"Well, who shall it be?" TV/TCI AN, the artist, figured as one of the jesters at the celebrated Eglinton tourna- ment. He was mounted upon an ass. Jerrold called him an ass ce?itaur ; and said that it was impossible to discover where one animal began and the other ended. Douglas Jerrold. 107 T N a work on The Duality of the M'uid, Dr Wigan gives the following anecdote : — That mysterious and incomprehensible thing, the ivill, has, we know, an important influence on the whole animal economy, and many instances have come before us where it has staved off insanity ; others where it has aided in restoring health. I will cite a case which is well-known to me, and which exemplifies this action, although unconnected with insanity. A cele- brated man of literature (Douglas Jerrold), dependent for his income on the labours of his pen — feeding his family, as he jocularly calls it, out of an inkstand — was in the advanced stage of a severe illness. After many hesitations, he ventured to ask his medical attendant if there was any hope. The doctor evaded the em- barrassing question as long as possible, but at last was compelled sorrowfully to acknowledge that there was none. "What," said the patient, "die, and leave my wife and five helpless children ! By , I won't die ! " The patient got better from that hour. — ^/\/\/\/V— JERROLD said, speaking of a young gentle- man who had dared the danger of print before he could hold a razor — "Nowadays men think they're frogs before they 're tadpoles." io8 Bon-Mots. JERROLD was enjoying a drive one day with a well-known man — a jovial spend- thrift. " Well, Jerrold," said the driver of a very fine pair of greys, " what do you think of my greys ? " "To tell you the truth," came the reply " I was just thinking of your duns ! " "\X7HEN "Black-Eyed Susan" was in re- hearsal at the Surrey Theatre, an im- portant person— in his own estimation— strutted upon the stage, and speaking of EUiston, the Bacchanalian man- ager, exclaimed in an angry voice — " How is this? I can see a duke or a prime minister any time in the morning, but I can never see Mr EUiston." " There 's one com- fort," Jerrold replied, ' ' if EUiston is invisible in the morning, he'll do the handsome thing any afternoon, by seeing you twice — for at that time of day he invariably sees double." Douglas Jerrold. 109 r\F a cold comic writer Jerrold said, He'd write an epigram upon his father's tomb- stone ! — v\/\/^//~ JERROLD on being told that a certain well- known tragedian was going to act Cardinal Wolsey, exclaimed — ' ' He Cardinal Wolsey ! — Linsey Woolsey ! " — '/\/Vv- — " nPHAT cat has got a cold," said a friend to Jerrold, pointing to a domestic favourite. " Yes," he replied, " the poor thing is subject to cat-arrh." — WVW— f\F a light, frivolous, flighty girl whom Jer- rold met frequently, he said, " That girl has no more head than a periwinkle." — -aajv^ — A N eccentric party, of which Jerrold was one, agreed to have a supper of sheep's heads. One gentleman present was particularly enthusi- astic on the excellence of the dish ; and, as he threw down his knife and fork, exclaimed, " Well, sheep's heads for ever, say I ! " "There's egotism!" quietly remarked Jer- rold. no Bon-Mots. A LADY passing a dog that was following at Jerrold's heels, exclaimed, " What a beautiful dog ! " " Ay, madam," said Jerrold, turning sharply round, "he looks z^^ry beautiful now; but he ate two babies yesterday." — ^aAAa'— T^OUGLAS JERROLD was at the Fielding Club once, as a guest, when the door opened and Albert Smith appeared. ' ' Mont Blanc is the monarch of mountains ! " cried someone, in would-be facetious salutation. "Yes," said Jerrold, "and Albert ' half- crown' ed him long ago. -wV\/Vv— V\/'HILE at an evening party, Jerrold was looking at the dancers. Seeing a very tall gentleman waltzing with a remarkably short lady, he said to a friend at hand, " Humph ! there 's the mile dancing with the mile-stone." — ->a/\Aa^- A N old lady was in the habit of talking in a gloomy, depressing manner, presenting to her friends only the sad side of life, " Hang it," said Jerrold, one day, after a long and sombre interview, ' ' she wouldn't allow there was a bright side to the moon," 112 Bon-Mots. " I^EVER mind his principles. Wordsworth, the man, may have been a snob and a scoundrel. Dear Hood once asked me to meet him, and I would not. I hated the man ; but then the poet had given me grand ideas, and I am grateful. Separate the writer from the writings. A truth is a truth — a fine thought is a fine thought. What matters it who is the mouthpiece ? When Coleridge says — " ' And winter, slumbering in the open air,'' Wore on his smiling face a dream of spring,' " what do I care for his being a sot and a tyrant. I agree it would be better for the poet to be a good man, but his poem would be the same. The inductive method is not false because Bacon took bribes and fawned on a tyrant. The theory of gravitation would have been true if it had been discovered by Greenacre. Siddons was a great actress, irrespectively of her being a good mother and a faithful wife. The world has no concern with an artist's private charac- ter. Are the cartoons less divine because Raphael lived with a mistress ? Art is art, and truth is truth, whatever may have been their agents." A jest ended the conversation in which Jer- rold had said this. Somebody mentioned the Jews in connection with Rachel, and Jerrold exclaimed, "as somebody once said in the ' House,' we owe much to the Jews." Douglas Jerrold. 113 A T a social club to which Jerrold belonged, the subject turned one evening upon music. The discussion was animated, and a certain song was cited as an exquisite composi- tion. "That air," exclaimed an enthusiastic member, " always carries me away when I hear it." Looking round the table, Jerrold anxiously inquired — " Can anybody whistle it ? " — vvWv^ A CRITIC one day talked about the humour of a celebrated novelist, dramatist, and poet, who was certainly no humourist. " Humour ! " exclaimed Jerrold, " why, he sweats at a joke, like a Titan at a thunderbolt ! " — A/WV" — A FAMOUS cook having put a flamingly high-flown and loving epitaph on his wife's tombstone, Jerrold, on hearing of it, said, " Ah, mock turtle." — a/\/V\a — JERROLD, at a party, noticing a doctor, in solemn black, waltzing with a young lady who was dressed in a silk of brilliant blue, e.x- claimed, " As I live ! there 's a blue pill dancing with a black draught ! " H 14 Bon-Mots. A GIRL, proud of her father's wealth, and shrewdly counting up the measure of its power, declared once to Jerrold, that she had made up her mind to marry a lord. But time wore on, and still no lord made even a nibble at the hook baited with bank-notes. The girl began to feel ner- vous : and still Time's hour-glass dribbled, in no way impeded by the poor girl's rapid progress to- wards thirty. At last, the soured woman became religious, and en- tered a convent. "Ah," said Jerrold, "as the lord would not come to her, she has gone to the Lord." —'A/V^/v— r^N one occasion when Leech had sung A^ing Death was a rare old fellow, with even more than his usual vigour, Douglas Jerrold exclaimed, " I say. Leech, if you had the same opportunity of exercising your voice as you have of using your pencil, how it would drawT' A Douglas Jerrold. 115 T a dinner of artists, a barrister present, hav- ing his name coupled with the toast of the law, began an embarrassed answer by saying he did not see how the law could be considered as one of the arts ; Jerrold jerked in the word black, and caused a roar of merriment. TLJENRY MAYHEW,* philosopher, who played— and wisely — with many sciences, and was jocund among the wits of the day, was discovered one day by Jerrold busy with cru- cibles, retorts, acids, and alkalies, making a mysterious experiment. The prudent philoso- pher had encased himself from head to foot in a suit of black oil-cloth. " Why, Henry," said Jerrold, " you look like a walking advertisement of Warren's blacking ! " A WRITER to whom Douglas Jerrold had given almost his first appearance in print, was at a later date among the most persevering and unscrupulous of his enemies. Some friend, as friends will, mentioned the ingratitude. "Never mind," said Jerrold, "the boy is sick to windward. It '11 all fly back in his face." * Author of London Labour and the London Poor, first editor of Punch. He married Jerrold's elder daughter. ii6 Bon-Mots. ^^yORDSWORTH was mentioned. Jerrold spoke of him in the warmest terms : — No writer, he said, has done me more good, excepting always Shakespeare. When I was a lad, I adored Byron — every lad does. Of course I laughed at Wordsworth and the lakers, and, of course, without knowing them. But one day I heard a line quoted, — '• She was known to every star in heaven, And every wind that blew." These lines sent me to Wordsworth, and, I assure you, it was like a new sense. For years I read him eagerly, and found consolation — the true test of genius — in his verse. In all my troubles his words have been the best medicine to my mind. — A/WW— r\N the first night of Sir E. Lytton's ''Sea Captain," when the hero came to that part of his ro/e where he exclaims, " The sea — my mother sea," Jerrold, who was present, said, " I have heard of Mother H., but never before of Mother C." — -^Ww— " TF an earthquake were to engulf England to-morrow," said Jerrold, "the English would manage to meet and dine somewhere among the rubbish, just to celebrate the event." Douglas Jerrold. 117 w HILE living at Putney, Douglas Jerrold ordered a brougham, plain and quiet. to be built for him. He went one morning to the coach-builder's shop to see the new carriage. Its surface was without a speck. " Ah ! " said the cus- tomer, as he turned to the back of the vehicle, " its polish is perfect now ; but the urchins will soon cover it witli scratches." " But, sir, I can put in a few spikes here that will keep any urchins off," the coach- maker answered. "By no means, man," was the sharp, severe reply. "And know that, to me, a thousand scratches on my carriage would be more welcome than one on the hand of a footsore lad, to whom a stolen lift^might be a godsend." -wWVv^ TV/TAN owes two solemn debts ; one to society, and one to nature. It is only when he pays the second that he covers the first. ii8 Bon-Mots. JERROLD hated the cant of philanthropy, and writhed whenever he was called phil- anthropist in print. On one occasion, when he found himself so described, he exclaimed, " Zounds, it tempts a man to kill a child, to get rid of the reputation," — aAJSJV- — /^N the death of Byron, Jerrold said — " God, wanting fire to give a million birth, Took Byron's soul to animate their earth ! " —A/\/\/Vv— 'T'HAT girl would break the Bank of England if she put her hand upon it. A LBERT SMITH once wrote an article in Blackwood, signed "A.S." "Tut," said Jerrold, on reading the initials, " what a pity Smith will tell only two-thirds of the truth." JERROLD was asking about the talents of a young painter when his companion de- scribed them as mediocre. "Oh!" was the comment, " the very worst ochre an artist can set to work with." Douglas Jerrold. 1 19 COMEBODY was talking of Robson the actor, and his wonderful "get up" as Jem Baggs in the Wandering Miiistrel, when presently the actor himself entered the room. " I hear your rags were wonderful," said Jerrold to him; "why not, for your benefit, advertise that you will play the part with real vermin?" -W\/\/\/V — A T the Lyon's customs, when on his way to Switzerland, Jerrold was asked the usual question — had he anything to declare ? "Yes," he said, "yes, only a live elephant — take care ! " — w\/vvv — COMEONE who had recently emerged from the humblest fortune and position, exult- ing in the social consideration of his new elevation, wished to put his antecedents away from him. While on horseback one morning he met Douglas Jerrold, and said to him, ostentatiously, " Well, you see, I 'm all right at last ! " "Yes," answered Jerrold, " I see you now ride upon your catsmeat." —'At\[\l\r— 'X'O a very thin man, who had been boring him, Jerrold said : "Sir, you are like a pin, but without either its head or its point." I20 Bon-Mots. JT was while walking home together from Serle's house, one bleak night of English spring, say theCowden Clarkes in their Recol- lections, that, in cross- ing Westminster Bridge, with an east wind blowing keenly- through every fold of clothing we wore, Jer. rold said to us, "I blame nobody; but they call this May /" — ^Al\/\iv— COME years ago London was covered with announcements of the permanent enlarge- ment of the Mortiing Herald. One day Jerrold called at the office, and on seeing the portly form of Mr Rodin, the publisher, said, " What ! Rodin, you, too, seem to be permanently en- larged ! " "QOUGLAS JERROLD took the chair at one of the anniversary dinners of the Eclectic Club — a debating society consisting of young barristers, authors, and artists. The piece de resistance had been a saddle of mutton. After dinner, the chairman rose and said, "Well, gentlemen, I trust that the noble saddle we have eaten has grown a wool-sack for one among you." Douglas Jerrold. 121 A GENTLEMAN described to Jerrold the bride of a mutual friend. "Why, he is six feet high, and she is the shortest woman I ever saw. What taste, eh ? " "Ay," Jerrold replied, "and only a taste ! " — AAyvv- — JERROLD described true Shakespearian grog as being made on the principle of — for the brandy, " nothing extenuate," — and the water, "put nought in, in malice." — WVV^"- TDEOPLE with one leg in the grave are so deviHsh long before they put in the other, they seem, like birds, to repose better on one leg. -wwv^ — AT a meeting of literary gentlemen, a propo- sition for the establishment of a news- paper arose. The shares of the various persons who were to be interested were in course of arrangement, when an unlucky printer sug- gested an absent litterateur, who was as remarkable for his imprudence as for his talent. "What!" exclaimed Jerrold, " share and risk with him ? Why, I wouldn't be partners with him in an acre of Paradise ! " 122 Bon-Mots. TOURING his Swiss tour, Jerrold found him- self and party at a very uncomfortable inn at Aix, the landlord of which, says Hep- worth Dixon, " unable to catch four live English every day, and finding our society pleasant and profitable, as he could charge us for dinners we never touched, told us overnight there were no places to be got for a week in the Chambery diligence, nor a single horse to be hired for posting. So Jerrold goes down before break- fast, makes a long face, and whispers to him that he fears one of the ladies is seized with cholera I The honest landlord suddenly recol- lects that horses and a very nice carriage may be got, and cheap too ! " JERROLD and a company of literary friends were out in the country, rambling over commons and down lanes. In the course of their walk, they stopped to notice the gambols of an ass's foal. There was a very sentimental poet among the baby ass's admirers, who grew eloquent as Sterne over its shaggy coat. At last the poet vowed that he should like to send the little thing as a present to his mother. "Do," Jerrold replied, "and tie a piece of paper round its neck, bearing this motto — *' ' When this you see, Remember me.' " 124 Bon-Mots. A T a bachelor party there was a gentleman remarkable for his thinness. Shall we call him Deedes? In the course of the evening, a servant opened the door, and the cold air rushed into the apartment. " By heavens ! quick! shut the door," cried Jerrold. " This draught will blow Deedes up the chimney ! " — a/\/\/Vn. — T^HE Rev, Francis Mahoney (" Father Prout") was asked, during the Museum Club dinner to Leigh Hunt, to which dish he would be served. ' ' Oh ! I '11 thank you for a slice of that leg of mutton," replied he. "Just like you, Mahoney," said Jerrold, "always trying to catch the Pope's eye." — 'A^i/v— JERROLD was dining at Greenwich with a congenial party but eight days before his death ; the party were the guests of W, H . Russell, the "Pen of the War," who asked Albert Smith to ring the bell for dinner. "Yes, Albert," said Jerrold, why '' don't yovi ring the bell(e)?" with a ready allusion to the rumours then current of an engagement between Smith and Miss Keeley. Douglas Jerrold. 125 JERROLD was seated in his accustomed fire- side corner of the Museum Club one night when the famous author-amateurs commenced their theatrical career ; the conversation turned upon taking a rural Thespian tour, and one of the amateurs was discoursing of the delights to be derived from a brief vagabondising life ; and concluded with : ' ' Suppose a lot of us go and play in the neat country barns, and billet our- selves in the nice country inns?" "Ay, and coo it, too," added Jerrold. "\7[7'HEN the affairs of Italy were the subject of general conversation in England, Jerrold was very enthusiastic in favour of Mazzini and his party. He was talking hope- fully and warmly on the subject one evening at a party, when a very cold and stiff and argumentative gentleman was present. This iced man interrupted Jerrold at every turn with a doubting "but." At last, Jerrold, fairly roused by the coolness of his opponent, turned sharply upon him, and said, "Sir, I'll thank you to throw no more of your cold water ' buts ' at me." — wwvv— JS^ PRETENTIOUS young gentleman, ela- borately dressed for an evening party, and whose hair was of that inflammatory hue 126 Bon-Mots. which is now generally regarded as undesirable, once thrust his head into the smoking-room of the Museum Club, and exclaimed, " Egad, I can't stay in this cloud." " I don't see," replied Jerrold, " how it can hurt you. Where there 's fire, there Jiiiisi be smoke ! " The inflammatory head was immediately withdrawn. "TjOUGLAS JERROLD, as midshipman on board His Majesty's brig Er?test, once fell into sad disgrace at Cuxhaven. He had gone ashore with the cap- '\ tain, and was left in charge ty^ of the boat. While the J^j^C^ commander was absent, two of the men in the mid- shipman's charge requested permission to make some trifling purchases. The good-natured officer as- sented, adding — " By the way, you may as well buy me some apples and a few pears." "All right, sir," said the men, and departed. The captain presently returned, and still the seamen were away on Douglas Jerrold. 127 their errand. They were searched for, but they could not be found. They had deserted, and the captain's blame fell, of course, on the midshipman. Upon the young delinquent the event made a lasting impression, and years afterwards he talked about it with that curious excitement which lit up his face when he spoke of anything he had felt. He remembered even the features of the two deserters, as he had, most unexpectedly, an opportunity of proving. Thirty years had passed, and the midship- man had become a fighter with a keener weapon than his dirk had ever proved, when one day walking eastward along the Strand, he was suddenly struck with the form and face of a baker, who, with his load of bread at his back, was examining some object in the window of the surgical instrument maker who puzzles so many inquisitive passers by near the entrance to King's College. There was no mistake ; the ex-midshipman walked nimbly to the baker's side, and rapping him sharply upon the back, said — " I say, my friend, don't you think you've been rather a long time about that fruit ? " The deserter's jaw fell. Thirty years had destroyed the fear of punishment. He re- membered the fruit and the little middy, for he said — " Lor' ! is that you, sir ? " The midshipman went on his way laughing. 128 Bon-Mots. A MEMBER coming into the Museum Club one night stated that he had just come from Lincoln's Inn Fields. He remarked that the ground was quite wet there, while in the neighbourhood of the club it was perfectly dry, and what could be the cause of the difference. " Perhaps the lawyers have something to do with it," suggested a second member. " Very likely," added Jerrold, " owing to the heavy dues." 'VXTHKN Mrs Stowe's popular story was being widely read by all classes, Douglas Jerrold propounded the following conundrum : — Why is it evident that Unc/e Tom's Cabin cannot be the production of a man's hand ? Because it bears the evident impress of Harriet Beecher's toe ! A CERTAIN publisher, whose action made him better known to than loved by authors who had dealings with him, was having his boots polished at a street corner, when Jerrold came up, and laying his hand on his shoulder, said, " I'm glad to find a publisher attempting to possess clean feet, for I can't say much for his hands." Douglas Jerrold. 129 r\N one occasion Douglas Jerrold took the chair at the annual dinner of the Eclectic Club, a discussion society, whose mem- bers were students in law and letters. After the cloth was drawn, the chairman, about to give the first toast, requested that the glasses should be charged ; afterwards rising to fulfil the duty imposed upon him, casting his eyes, first down one side of the table, and then down the other, he exclaimed: — ' ' I believe, gentle- men, that you are all charged — for the Queen, Prince Albert, and the rest of the Royal Family." -WW/ ^ SIDNEY COOPER, the artist, having told Jerrold that certain persons shunned meeting him because of his bitter tongue, he said, with great energy, " Sidney, I have never in my life said or written a bitter thing of any- one who did not deserve it." I30 Bon- Mots. 'pHACKERAY having announced that he had just stood god-father to a friend's Uttle boy, "Lord, Thackeray," exclaimed Jerrold, ''I hope you didn't give the child your own mug." "S" IR, there is but one path to substantial greatness — the path of statesmanship. For though you set out in a threadbare coat and a hole in either shoe, if you walk with a cautious eye to the sides, you'll one day find yourself in velvet and gold, with music in your name, and money in your pocket." — f^J\f\fV' — A POPULAR writer began a series entitled "The Latchkey," in two or three new publications. But each failed before the series was half-finished. "Tut," said Jerrold, "that latchkey seems to be made to open and shut any publication." — A/\/\/V« — T~\AVIDGE, the avaricious manager of the Surrey Theatre, died early one evening. A friend carried the news to Jerrold. "Hang it," said Jerrold, "I should have thought he would wait till the half-price had come in." " %u/ 132 Bon-Mots, A VERY popular medical gentleman called on Jerrold one day. When the visitor was about to leave, Jerrold, looking from his library windovi', espied his friend's carriage, attended by servants in flaming liveries. " What ! doctor, I see your livery is measles turned up with scarlet fever. " QOME prosy old gentleman wasin the habit of waylaying Jerrold, whenever he met him, to have a chat in the street. Jerrold dis- liked very naturally to be held by the but- ton-hole in a crowded thoroughfare. One day Prosy met his victim, and, planting himself in the way, said, " Well, Jerrold, what is going on to-day?" Jerrold (sharply, and darting past the inquirer), "I am ! " T AMAN BLANCH ARD and Jerrold were strolling together about London, discussing passionately a plan for joining Byron in Greece. Jerrold, telling the story many years after, said, " But a shower of rain came on and washed all the Greece out of us." Douglas Jerrold. 133 JERROLD was challenged once by a friend to make a pun on any subject which should be given, and on engaging to do so, the friend added, " Well, I 'm sure you can't pun on the Zodiac." " By Gemini, I can-cer," said Jerrold. — My\A^ — r\N one occasion at the Mulberry Club, it was suggested that the members' knowledge of Shakespeare should be tested in a novel manner. A word was given to each person which they were to define by an appropriate quotation. On its becoming Jerrold's turn, his neighbour suggested an apparently hopeless word, "tread- mill," but Jerrold instantly and happily replied in Lear's well-known words, "Down — thou climbing sorrow." ■r\OUGLAS JERROLD, dining with a friend, was asked how he liked the port. ' ' Not much," he replied. "Not much! Why, my dear fellow, it's Hedge's and Butler's best." "Possibly," said Jerrold, "but to my taste it partakes more of the hedges than the butler." 134 Bon- Mots. JERROLD was talking about a well-known comic lecturer, and of his tendency to re- duce any subject to the absurd. " Egad, sir ! that fellow would vulgarise the day of judg- ment ! " — ^AAA'^ JERROLD was one of a rowing party, and when off the " Swan " at Battersea, by some mismanagement of the boat he fell backward into the water. He was taken into the boat with much difficulty, conveyed ashore, and put to bed in the " Swan " Inn, where he was left. On the following day he joined his friends to laugh over the accident, and to repeat a conversation he had had with the " Swan " chambermaid. Jerrold remarked, "I suppose these accidents happen frequently off here." " Oh, yes, sir," the maid replied, "frequently ; but it isn't the season yet." "Ah!" said Jerrold, "I suppose it is all owing to the backxvard Spring f " " That 's it, sir," sharply answered the maid. A WOULD-BE wit having fired off all his stale jokes before Jerrold, but without effect, at last exclaimed, "Why, you never laugh when I say a good thing." ' ' Don't I ? " retorted Jerrold, ' ' only try me with one." 136 Bon-Mots. A GOURMET iomed a social club to which Jerrold belonged, and opened a conversa- tion on dining. 'I Now nobody," said this London Savarin, " can guess what I had for dinner to-day I " The company declined to speculate, where- upon the gourmet said, with an air, "Why, calfs-tail soup ! " " Extremes meet ! " rapped out Jerrold. /^NE day Mr Tilbury entered a room where Jerrold was talking with some friends. Macready was about to produce "Macbeth" at Covent Garden ; Tilbury complained that he had been cast for the Physician, having previously been entrusted with the more genial part of Witch. "Made you the Physician !" said Jerrold. ' ' Humph— that is throwing physic to the dogs with a vengeance ! " -^A!\[\t^r— JERROLD was walking along the Strand . one day, when he met Charles Selby, exquisitely gloved. Jerrold had a pair of modest Berlin gloves on. He glanced first at his own unassuming hands, and said, " Tut ! — original writing ! " Then pointing to Selby's faultless yellow kid, added, "Translation!" Douglas Jerrold. 137 A GENTLEMAN of a somewhat ardent temperament paid great attention to his pretty servant in the absence of his wife. The good wife, before leaving London, had made a store of pickles and preserves that were to adorn her table till the following year. But the husband, taking Time vigorously by the forelock, shared the sweets of the year with the temporary object of his affections. When the wife returned, the pickle-jars were empty. "Conceive his baseness, my dear," said the injured wife to a female friend, "he not only destroyed my peace of mind, but with a deprav- ity that makes one shudder, he actually ate all my pickles." In the following spring Jerrold met the husband and wife in Covent Garden Market, walking lovingly. Jerrold — pointing to a sieve of young wal- nuts — " Going to do anything in this way this year?" "\A/'HEN Jerrold was once returning from the Continent, a Folkstone custom- house officer seized his carpet-bag — a very small one— and said, " I cannot let that pass — you must tell me what's in it." "In this reticule!" Jerrold replied, "well, you shall see it ; but I can assure you that it 's only a very small hippopotamus." 138 Bon-Mots. V\/'HEN Jerrold was living at Boulogne, he caught rheumatism in the eyes. He was attended by a coarse, brutal, French doctor, who blistered him severely, to no pur- pose. Jerrold was in a dark room for several weeks, under the ineffec- -V ^ y-^- ^- tual treatment of "^ — / ' xJ^ this unpleasant practitioner. One day the doctor was dressing the blister roughly, when his patient winced. " Ce litest riett — ce 11 est rieii ! " said the doctor. Presently some hot water was brought in for the doctor's hands. The doctor dipped his fingers into the basin, but withdrew them rapidly, with a loud exclamation, for the water was nearly boiling. Jerrold could not resist the opportunity — ill as he was, he said to the scalded doctor, imitating his voice, " Ce 71^ est rien — ce ?t'est rieii /" — wv\/Va— CCISSORS Jerrold defined as "an editor's 5/'^^/-pen.'"' Douglas Jerrold. 139 JERROLD met a well-known picture-collector, whom he knew, on Waterloo Bridge. The collector was possessed with a passion for Richard Wilson's pictures, and on the occasion in question asserted that the canvas he had under his arm w^as a veritable example of his favourite master, which he had just picked up in the Waterloo Road. Propping the picture against the parapet of the bridge, he drew Jerrold's attention to its evidences of authenticity. ' ' See Jerrold — with those trees — that sky— it must be a Richard Wilson." "Well," Jerrold replied, "considering the locality where you found it, are you sure it isn't a Harriet W'ilson? " — ^aAA/"^— "\^HEN told that somebody had spoken something against him, had indeed systematically abused him, Jerrold quietly observed. ' ' Ah ! I suppose I have done him a good turn." /^F a mysterious gentleman who spoke many languages, and all equally well, and whose native country could not be ascertained, Jerrold said, " It 's my faith he was born in a balloon." 140 Bon-Mots. 'THE tax-gatherer once said to Jerrold— " Sir, I 'm determined to put a man in the house." Jerrold replied, with a laugh, "Couldn't you make it a woman ? " C AID a lady, getting on in years, to Douglas Jerrold, " Do you think, Mr Jerrold, that it can be the essence of myrrh that I use, which is making my hair grey? " '' Madam," he replied, " I should say it was the essence of thyme ! " — ^A/VW— JERROLD admired Carlyle ; but objected -^ that he did not give definite suggestions for the improvement of the age which he rebuked. " Here," said he, " is a man who beats a big drum under my windows, and when I come running downstairs, has nowhere for me to go. " -^Ai\[\rj~ A LFRED BUNN met Jerrold one day in Jermyn Street. Bunn stopped Jerrold, and said, "What! I suppose you 're strolling about, picking up character." ' ' Well, not exactly ; but there 's plenty lost hereabouts." Douglas Jerrold. 141 AN empty-headed fellow was boasting to Douglas Jerrold that he was never sea-sick. " Never ! " echoed Jerrold ; " then I 'd almost put up with your head to have your stomach." 'TOGETHER with his wife and Mr and Mrs Hepworth Dixon, Douglas Jerrold set forth to visit Switzerland and the Rhine. Italy, also, had been marked upon their programme, but on going to the Austrian Consul in London for the visa of Jerrold's passport, that func- tionary remarked that " he had orders not to admit Mr Douglas Jerrold within Austrian territory. " " That shows your wea ness, not my strength," said the applicant to the consul. " I wish you good morning." — vVWv — A MONG his many travel-projects, Douglas Jerrold once contemplated a visit to Constantinople ; but, giving it up suddenly, he turned laughingly to his wife and said, " Well, my dear, if it ca7i^t be Constantinople, what do you say to Highgate?" 142 Bon- Mots. /^NE young friend whom Jerrold regarded with great admiration, confessed to him that he had had the hardihood to attack him in a comic journal before they were acquainted. This friend was James Hannay, the author of Singleton Fontenoy, a writer who had also started life on salt water. They were together two ex-midshipmen at Southend, when the younger one made this confession to his companion. "Never mind, my boy," answered Jerrold, " every young man has spilt ink that had better been left in the horn." — vVWv^ J^OUGLAS JERROLD met a Scot whose name was Leitch, and who carefully ex- plained that he w'as not the popular carica- turist, John Leech. " I 'm aware of that," said Jerrold, " you're the Scotchman with the i-t-c-h in your name." COME friends were talking with Jerrold about an eminent litterateur, who was a devoted admirer and constant companion of Charles Dickens. " In fact," said one of the friends, "he is to Dickens what Boswell was to Johnson." " With this difference," Jerrold replied, " that Forster doesn't do the Boz well." Douglas Jerrold. 143 T^AVENANT about to cut down and put music to "Othello ! " He takes away the golden wires of Apollo and puts in their place his own cat-gut. A GENTLEMAN waited upon Jerrold one morning to enlist his sympathies in behalf of a friend, who was in want of a round sum of money. But this friend had already sent his hat about among his literary brethren on more than one occasion. His hat was becoming an institution ; and the friends were grieved at the indelicacy of the proceeding. On the occasion to which we now refer, the bearer of the hat was received by Jerrold with evident dissatisfaction. "Well," said Jerrold, "how much does he want this time?" "Why just a four and two noughts will, I think, put him straight," the bearer of the hat replied. "Well, put me down for one of the noughts." — www— COME people were praising the writings of a certain Scot. When Jerrold said, " I quite agree with you that he should have an itch in the Temple of Fame." 144 Bon-Mots. AT a club, of which Jerrold was a member, a fierce Jacobite, and a friend, as fierce, of the cause of William the Third, were arguing noisily, and dis- turbing less ex- citable conversa- tionalists. At length the Jaco- bite, a brawny Scot, brought his fist down heavily upon the table, ..• and roared at his adversary — " I tell you what it is, sir, I spit upon your King William ! " The friend of the Prince of Orange was not to be out- mastered by mere lungs. He rose, and roared back to the Jacobite — "And I, sir, spit upon your James the Second ! " Jerrold, who had been listening to the up- roar in silence, hereupon rung the bell, and shouted — ' ' Waiter ! spittoons for two ! " Douglas Jerrold, 145 nPHE Adelphi company once removed, tem- porarily, to the Haymarket Theatre. Jerrold, being asked his opinion on the change, replied: "The master and mistress are out; and the servants have got into the drawing- room." — 'A/W^— C AID Douglas Jerrold to a lady on breaking her watch, "It is the privilege of beauty to kill time." —A/\/\JV- — JERROLD, who went to a party at which a Mr Pepper had assembled all his friends, said to his host, on entering the room, "My dear Mr Pepper, how glad you must be to see all your friends mustered ! " — v'AA'V^ — A/TY notion of a wife at forty is, that a man should be able to change her, like a bank-note, for two twenties. ^AAA'— C OMEBODY told Jerrold that a friend of his, a prolific writer, was about to dedicate a book to him. "Ah!" replied Jerrold, with mock gravity, ' ' that 's an awful weapon he has in his hands ! " K 146 Bon-Mots. nrO an impertinent fellow, whom Jerrold avoided, and who attempted to intrude himself by saying a sharp thing, Jerrold said, quickly turning upon the intruder, "You're like lead, sir, bright only when you 're cut." — WWXa^ — J^R WILLIAM SMITH invited Douglas Jerrold to accompany him and a German friend on an expedition to Hampton Court. At lunch the foreign guest asked if the salad were not gritty ? "Gritty!" cried Jerrold, "it's simply a gravel path with a few weeds in it ! " T^HEN an acquaintance came to Jerrold and said, indignantly, " I hear you said my nose was like the ace of clubs ! " He re- plied, " No, I did not ; but now I look at it, I see it is — very like." 'T'HE publisher of Dcntleys Miscellany said to Jerrold, "I had some doubts about the name I should give the magazine ; I thought at one time of calling it the Wits' Miscellany.'" " Well," was the rejoinder, " but you needn't have gone to the other extremity." 148 Bon-Mots. A WILD republican said, profanely, that Louis Blanc was next to our Saviour. " On which side? " Jerrold asked. — v^^Ww— JERROLD was at a party when the Park guns announced the birth of a prince ; he exclaimed: •' How they do powder these babies ! " — A/ww— /^F a celebrated actress who, in her declining days, bought charms of carmine and pearl-powder, Jerrold said, " Egad, she should have a hoop about her, with a notice upon it, ' Beware of the paint.' " — A/WV- — T^HE first time Jerrold saw Tom Dibdin, the song-writer said to him — "Youngster, have you sufficient confidence in me to lend me a guinea? " "Oh! yes," w^as the reply; "I've all the confidence, — but I haven't the guinea." — ^v/Wv- — /^ARLYLE and a much inferior man being coupled by some sapient reviewer, as biographers, Jerrold exclaimed — "Those two joined! You cannot plough with an ox and an ass ! " Douglas Jerrold. 149 A GENTLEMAN, who was remarkable at once for Bacchanalian devotion and re- markably large and prominent eyes, was, one evening, the suVjject of conversation. The question appeared to be, whether the gentleman in question wore upon his face any signs of his excesses. "I think so," said Jerrold, "for I always know when he has been in his cups by the state of his saucers." — -A/VVv^- TN the midst of a stormy discussion, a gentle- man rose to settle the matter in dispute. Waving his hands majestically over the excited disputants, he began : — " Gentlemen, all I want is common sense — " "Exactly," Jerrold interrupted, "that is precisely what you do want ! " The discussion was lost in a burst of laughter. '' "LJ AVE you seen the wife of poor Augustus ? " a gentleman asked Jerrold, referring to a friend. " No ; what 's the matter .'* " said Jerrold. " Why, I can assure you, she's a complete wreck." " Then, I suppose," replied Jerrold,.'' he'll be the jolly-boat to put off from her ! " I50 Bon-Mols. " WT^E row in the same boat, you know," said a literary friend to Jerrold. This literary friend was a comic writer, and a comic writer only. Jerrold replied — " True, my good fellow, we do row in the same boat, but with very differ- ent skulls." — wwv^ — PDMUND YATES in his Recollections has the following story of Douglas Jerrold : — I had been one of a party which had escorted him, after the successful pro- duction of one of his com- edies — the Cats-paw, I think — to the Bedford Hotel in.Co- vent Garden, where supper was prepared. Jerrold was flushed with triumph, but his bodily strength was small, and he hung on to my arm. As we went up New Street, we met two or three drunken roysterers, one of whom, after tumbling up against me, apologized, and asked the way to the Judge and Jury, a popular entertainment of the day. Instantly Jerrold bent forward and ad- dressed him : " Straight on, young man. Con- tinue in the path you are now pursuing, and you can't fail to come to them." Douglas Jerrold. 151 'X'HIS is another of Edmund Yates's remin- iscences : — In the spring of the year in which Jerrold died, Mr Benjamin Webster had a pleasant gathering of friends at his quaint old home by Kennington Church, to celebrate the birthday of his daughter. Jerrold was there, playing whist ; in the adjoining room they were dancing. Touching him on the shoulder, I asked — "Who is that man, Jerrold, there, dancing with Mrs Jerrold? " He looked round, for an instant, through the open door. " God knows, my dear boy ! " he replied, ' ' some member of the Humane Society, I suppose." QAM PHILLIP met Douglas Jerrold one *^ day and told him that he had seen Payne Collier the day before, looking wonderfully gay and well — quite an evergreen. " Ah," said Jerrold, " he may be ever green, because he is never-read. " 152 Bon-Mots. JERROLD was in France, and with a French- man who was enthusiastic on the subject of the Anglo-French alHance. He said that he was proud to see the Enghsh and French such good friends at last, when Jerrold promptly answered : ' ' Tut ! the best thing I know be- tween France and England is — the sea." A FAVOURITE dog followed Jerrold every- where. One day, in the country, a lady who was passing, turned round, and said, audibly, " What an ugly little brute !" where- upon, Jerrold, addressing the lady, replied, " Oh, madam ! I wonder what bethinks about us at this moment ! " — v\/\/v^ JERROLD was showing off the accomplish- ments of a favourite terrier. " Does he beg? " asked a visitor. " Beg ! " replied Jerrold, " ay, like a prince of the blood ! " — aVV\a — QOME people were talking with Jerrold about a gentleman as celebrated for the intensity as for the shortness of his friendships. "Yes," said Jerrold, " his friendships are so warm that he no sooner takes them up than he puts them down again." Douglas Jerrold. 153 CUNDAY afternoons Douglas Jerrold often spent in the Zoological Garden? — natural history always having had great attractions for him — and would always have something brisk and sprightly to say as he stood surveying the birds and =-' beasts. The mandril suddenly turned, revealing the rich colours of his hind quarters. "Ah!" said Jerrold, "that young gentleman must have been sitting upon a rainbow." — A/\/\/\^ — "XltTHEN Macbeth w^as played, many years ago, at the Coburg Theatre, a certain actor was cast, to his great disgust, for Mac- duff. He told his bitter disappointment to Jerrold, who thus consoled him : — "Never mind, my good fellow, there's one advantage in playing Macduff — it keeps you out of Banquo." —aAJSJV' — " r^ OD has written ' honest man ' on his face," said a friend to Jerrold, speaking of a person in whom Jerrold's faith was not altogether blind. " Humph ! " Jerrold replied, " then the pen must have been a very bad one." 154 Bon-Mots. "yiT'ALKING in the country, Douglas Jerrold, plucking a buttercup or some other simple liower of the fields, was wont to say, "If they cost a shilling a root, how beautiful they would be." —^A/VW— A N eminent artist, celebrated for his love of discussion, paused once in the middle of one of his speeches ; then said — " I was thinking." " Thinking ! impossible ! I don't believe it," Jerrold replied. — ^WW- pj-ATHANIEL HAWTHORN, Charles Mackay, and Douglas Jerrold were dining together at the Reform Club, when the conver- sation having turned upon ' ' the art of sculpture and the glorification of the nude," Hawthorn expatiated upon the perfection of the human form, asserting that it was impossible for the wit or ingenuity of the wisest or most imaginative of men to suggest the slightest improvement. " Don't you think," said Mackay, " it might be an improvement upon the divine human form, if by an unseen apparatus we might, by a mere effort of the will, be able to shut our ears against a disagreeable, and against a prosy and long-winded speech, or against the firing Douglas Jerrold. 1 5 5 of guns, or against the odious shriek of the railway whistle, just as easily as we can shut our eyes against a sight that displeases us ? " "Decidedly," said Jerrold, laughing, "and I should like a similar power to be conferred upon the nose, so that it might shut out a bad smell, — mine is unusually sensitive. I like the idea of nose-lids as well as eye-lids. It is a clumsy method, at best, to stop your ears with your hands, or to take your nose between your fingers, to exclude the smell of paint, or gas, or the abominations of the common sewer." — 'AA/V'— "XiyHEN a man has nothing in the world to lose, he is then in the best condition to sacrifice for the public good everything that is his. — WVVv— A GENTLEMAN who enjoyed the reputation of dining out continually, and of breaking bread with the refinement of a gourmet, once joined a party, which included Jerrold, late in the evening. The diner-out threw himself into a chair, and exclaimed with disgust, "Tut! I had nothing but a d — d mutton chop for dinner ! " "Ah! I see," said Jerrold, "you dined at home." 156 Bon-Mots. 'AID an individual to Jerrold one evening in a green-room — " I believe you know a very particular friend of mine, Mrs Blank ? " Now Mrs Blank was remarkable for beauty, but it was the beauty of Venus, by no means that of Diana. ' ' I have met with an actress named Mrs Blank," replied Jer- rold, " but she cannot be the partic7ilar friend you allude to." ' ' I beg your pardon," said his companion, "it is the same person." " Excuse me, sir," Jerrold replied, " the lady I speak of is not very particular." — ^A/\/\/v— A YOUNG author, somewhat too proud of a religious work he had written, entitled "Schism and Repentance," wished Jerrold to subscribe for a copy. Jerrold replied that he might put him down for "Schism" by all means, but he would advise him to keep " Repentance " for his publishers and readers. Douglas Jerrold. 157 A LADY said to her husband, in Jerrold's presence — '* My dear, you certainly want some new trousers." '*No, I think not," rephcd the husband. "Well," Jerrold interposed, "I think the lady who always wears them ought to know." — ^/\/VW— A CERTAIN sharp attorney was said to be in bad circumstances. A friend of the unfortunate lawyer met Jerrold, and said, " Have you heard about poor R. ? His business is going to the devil." * ' That 's all right— then he is sure to get it back again," said Jerrold. — A/WVv — ■QOUGLAS JERROLD, in describing a meeting with Carlyle at Bulwer Lytton's, said they had spoken of Tawill (the murderer of the day). Jerrold saying something about the absurdity of capital punishment, Carlyle burst out — ' '• The wretch ! I would have had him trampled to pieces underfoot and buried on the spot ! " " Cui bono — cui bono f " said Jerrold. /""ERTAINLY man's wicked angel is in nionev. 158 Bon-Mots, A GENTLEMAN, when the cholera was rag- ing in London, complained to his landlady that the water with which she made his tea had a strong and unwholesome flavour. " Well, sir," said the landlady, " I can only account for it by the graveyard at the back of the house. The spring must pass through it ! " The lodger rushed frantically from the house, and presently met Jerrold, to whom he com- municated his trouble, and who consoled him, saying, " I suppose your landlady thought you liked your tea like your port— with plenty of body in it ! " JERROLD and some friends were dining in a private room at a tavern. After dinner, the landlord appeared, and having informed the company that the house was partly under repair, and that he was inconvenienced for want of room, requested that a stranger might be allowed to take a chop at a separate table in the apartment. The company assented, and the stranger, a person of common-place appearance, was introduced. He ate his chop in silence ; but having finished his repast, he disposed himself for those forty winks which make the sweetest sleep of gourmets. But the stranger snored so loudly and inharmoniously that conversation was disturbed. Some gentle- men of the party now jarred glasses, or Douglas Jerrold. 1 59 shuffled upon the floor, determined to arouse the obnoxious sleeper. Presently the stranger started from his sleep and to his legs, and shouted to Jerrold, "I know you, Mr Jerrold ; but you shall not make a butt of me ! " "Then don't bring your hog's head in here," was the prompt reply. — -A/Vv^— VA/HEN the Marylebone vestrymen were discussing the propriety of laying down wood pavement within their parish, and were raising difficulties on the subject, Jerrold, as he read the report of the discussion, said,— "Difficulties in the way ! Absurd. They have only to put their heads together, and there is the wood pavement." * — %aAA/''— T^O a popular adapter of dramatic pieces from the French, Jerrold suggested as a motto : Aut scissors aut nuUus. * This joke has been erroneously given to Sidney SniUh. i6o Bon-Mots. T^ITH fanaticism in all forms Douglas Jerrold had little sympathy, and so, speaking of certain notable teetotal reformers of the time, he said, "Temperance is an ad- mirable quality, even as peace is a blessing ; but somehow, as there are certain men who become public disturbers in the name of peace, so are there teetotallers who make more noise upon water than other men upon wine. They have continual water on the brain, and, like an overflowing pump, it continually runs out of their mouths. " — WVW— T^ESCRIBING a man of strong conservative character, Jerrold said that he would have opposed vaccination as interfering with the marked privileges of small-pox. -w\/\/Vv— A FRIEND was describing to Jerrold the story of his courtship and marriage. How his wife had been brought up in a convent, and was on the point of taking the veil, when his presence burst upon her enraptured sight. Jerrold listened to the end of the story, and by way of comment said, ' ' Ah ! she evidently thought you better than nun." Douglas Jerrold. i6i A WOMAN is like tar — only melt her, and she will take any form you please. — M/W^^ T^ESCRIBING the sordid avarice of a cer- tain Hebrew bill-discounter Jerrold said : " The only difference between Moses and Judas Iscariot is that Moses would have sold our Saviour for more money." ^A/VW— ■piTZBALL, the dramatist, and grand com- pounder in his day of "blue fire," "terrific combats," and other melodramatic elements, was complacently repeating in the presence of Douglas Jerrold, that "some one had called him the Victor Hugo of the English stage." " Much more likely the Victor Nogo," said Jerrold. — A/\/\/V\<— QAID an ardent and somewhat boastful sportsman — "I can bring down anything." "Can you? I wish you'd bring down the taxes." — aA^VVa— " 'X'HERE are some squeamish people," said Douglas Jerrold, " who having but little honesty themselves, make up for the want by their uncharitable suspicions of others." L 1 62 Bon-Mots. IMAGINING a picture of the "City gentle- man," Jerrold spoke of him as, "Calm, plain, self-assured in the might of his wealth. All the bullion of the Bank of England makes back- ground details ; the India House dawns in the distance, and a hundred pennants from masts in India Docks tremble in the far-off sky." —M/\/W- /^EREMONY is a scarecrow to awestrike fools. Douglas Jerrold. 163 r\F a physically poor man of talents, Douglas Jerrold said, "His body is weak, but his mind tremendous — a Damascus blade in a scabbard of brown paper." -W\/\/\/V-— 'X'HE commercial spirit of the age was summed up by Jerrold thus, "We live in twopenny times, when chivalry goes to church in the family coach, and the god of marriage bargains for his wedding breakfast." —^/\/\J\/W- '' T AURELS," on another occasion Jerrold said upon a similar theme, "are fast sinking from the camp to the kitchen. In a very little while the cook will rob Caisar of his wreath to flavour a custard." "\7[7"HEN men would prove relationship to greatness, they care not how. If greatness were a polecat, rather than be no part of it, they would be its odour. — wVWv— C^N some inhuman deed perpetrated in the name of religion : " If such be religion, oh ! take, take away the dove, and let the red-beaked vulture be her ghostly symbol." 164 Bon-Mots. A GOOD murder is now the very life of the drama. Thus, if a playwright would fill his purse, he should take a hint from the sugar baker and always refine his commodity with blood. — A/\/\/V' — r\F a man sombre and melancholy in the midst of gorgeous pageantry : He reminds me of a spear — the handle, painted and carved with an amorous and jovial story — Cupid's bow and Bacchus' grapes — ending in cold iron. r^OLD words — the courtly frost that freezes the red blood within the cheek of hope. — wwvv— ■p^ON'T call it a face— it 's like a bank-note, every line in it means money. — WW^~ 'IXT'ORLDLY greatness ! 'tis the silken sem- blance of a giant blown out with wind ; but prick the shining covering, silently Colossus shrinks into a pigmy, and the vile herd that shook and bowed before the monster now use his shrunk skin to carpet their ungrateful feet ! 1 66 Bon-Mots. /^F a man whose double dealing had roused his wrath Douglas Jerrold said, he was a varlet who acknowledged no villainy on the safe side of an Act of Parliament. -wvw^— " 'X'HERE are people," said Douglas Jerrold, ' ' who make even a million a very small matter, merely by their condescending way of speaking of it." /^F a would-be wit who strove to sparkle before him, Jerrold said, " Surely the wit of the gentleman is small — he takes such pains to show it." •— sAAA'/— r\F an exemplary schoolmaster Jerrold said, " It was his prejudice to prefer one slip of olive to a whole grove of birch." — vvw^- J\^ PARTICULARLY cool and collected in- dividual was being discussed : He would eat oysters while his neighbour's house was in flames — always provided that his own was insured. Coolness ! — he 's a piece of marble, carved into a broad grin. Douglas Jerrokl, 167 TN this world truth can wait— she 's used to it. T^HE following lines were spoken impromptu by Douglas Jerrold on seeing the daughter of Sir Joseph Paxton standing upon a leaf of the Victoria Regia in one of the hot-houses at Chatsworth, on an occasion perhaps sufficiently explained in the verses : — On unbent leaf in fairy guise, Reflected in the water, — Beloved, admired, by hearts and eyes — Stands Annie, Paxton's daughter. Accept a wish, my little maid, — Begotten of the minute — That scene so fair may never fade, You still the fairy in it. -w\/\/Vj— T F sanctity spring from a hair shirt I marvel we do not canonise the bears. — vV\/\/v— C PEAKING of an ex-publican a friend said to Jerrold — " My dear fellow he has no head." "That's easily explained," Jerrold replied, " he gave it all away with his porter." [68 Bon-Mot? TQOUGLAS JERROLD said that whenever England is destroyed her political Jeremiahs neither rend their Saxony nor sprinkle ashes on their bursting heads ; but straightway ship their woes, and steam to a tavern. "England beloved," cries our modern pat- riot, " is wiped from the world ! Waiter, some Burgundy ! " — a/VVAa— i~\F a crotchety man Jerrold said, " He is one of those fellows who dive into the well of truth, and croak only with the frogs at the bottom." Douglas Jerrold. 169 "LT E lives like a spider under a fretted dome, a worm within a dusty drinking cup. TT being told to Jerrold that there was a rumour that the Duke of Wellington was going to marry Miss Burdett-Coutts he ex- claimed that it would be an extraordinary union of iron and tin. r^ LORY— 'tis but a bubble blown from blood ! law — a spider's wisdom ; and politics — the statesman ponders and plans, winning nothing certain but ingratitude and indigestion ; whilst for woman we hunt a wildfire and vow it is a star. 'yHAT fellow can cover more brain with the end of his little finger than many with their whole palm ! There is no handling him ; touch him where you will, and like a porcupine he pierces you. — vVWv^ — "LJONOUR with a crack in it, said Jerrold, like flawed china, may be made to serve well enough, if only handled carefully. lyo Bon-Mots. INDIGNANT with some over zealous tem- perance crusaders Jerrold said, " There are teetotallers who make more noise upon water than other men make upon wine. They have continual water on the brain, and, like an everflowing pump, it continually runs out of their mouths." — wvvw— A CERTAIN pretty actress being mentioned, Douglas Jerrold praised her early beauty. " She was a lovely little thing," he said, " when she was a bud and" — (a pause) — "before she was a bio wen." -^A/VW— A LITERARY caller upon Douglas Jerrold happening to ask what Thackeray was like, Jerrold said, " He 's just a big fellow with a broken nose, and though I meet him weekly at the Pimch dinner, I don't know him so well as I know you." TT being said that an attorney was a kind of conscience-keeper to his client, Jerrold remarked that, when men trust their con- sciences to such keepers is it to be wondered at if they are returned soiled ? Douglas Jerrold. 1 7 1 C PEAKING of the work of some minor poet of the day much talked of at the time, Jerrold said that he was to the poet, as the kitten with eyes just opened to the merits of a saucer of milk, compared with the lion in his majesty, glaring athwart the desert. Then he added — " There is the true Helicon, and there is such a thing as the smallest of small beer over-kept in a tin mug — with the dead flies in it." — AA/V^- " CTUDY the law," exclaimed Douglas Jerrold, "and see recorded, aye ten thousand times, how Quibble with his varnished cheek, hath laughed defrauded Justice out of court ! " 172 Bon-Mots. T IKE a tailor's pattern-book society is of all colours, and yet make up the colours as you will, they all cover the same kind of Adam. —^/\/\/\/v— A BOOK Douglas Jerrold called a blessed companion, "a book that, fitly chosen, is a life-long friend. A book — the unfailing Damon to his loving Pythias. A book that, at a touch, pours its heart into our own." TT is the implements of husbandry, said Jerrold, that conquer the wilderness, making the earth smile with the noblest of victories. — WVW— /^N some notorious instance of a clerical pluralist, Douglas Jerrold said that such men, ' ' take the cure of souls as men take the cure of herrings, at so much per hundred — with this difference, that the soul curers do nothing, and the herring curers fulfil their contract." — vvVVv— T^rHEN men join for freedom, the cause itself does consecrate the act. Douglas Jerrokl. 173 A WOMAN, said Douglas Jerrokl, will forgive anything but a jest. Break her heart and she '11 fit the pieces together, and, with a smile, assure the penitent that no mischief is done — indeed, and indeed, she was never better. Break a joke, light as a water- bubble, upon her constancy, her magnanimity, — nay, upon her cookery, — and take good heed ; she declares war — war to the scissors. "^^/■E are poor fools, and make sad mistakes ; but there is goodness hived, like wild honey, in strange nooks and corners of the world. ' ' A MAN is safe," said Douglas Jerrold, ' ' only so long as he talks his love — to write it is to impale himself upon his own pot-hooks." — WW''^ INTENSE impudence, according to Jerrold, is the true philosopher's stone. —^J\/\/V- — "D EFERRING to some notorious trial Douglas Jerrold asked, "did we legis- late a little more for the cradle, might we not be spared some pains for the hulk?" 174 Bon-Mots. J^OUGLAS JERROLD pointed out the insularity of your true cockney when abroad, saying, ''The inn at which he puts up, it is his boast, is kept by an Enghshman ; the dinners are Enghsh ; the waiter is EngUsh ; the chambermaid is Enghsh ; the boots is Enghsh ; and the barber who comes to shave him, if he be not Enghsh, has at least this recommendation — he has in his time lived five years in Saint Mary Axe and is almost English. " — ~A/\/\r^— C PEAKING of some parson of many livings, Douglas Jerrold exclaimed, that he "had no faith in such folyjii parsons, pulpit things, with many stomachs and no hearts ! " Douglas Jerrold. 175 nr HE great secret, according to Douglas' J err old, is poverty — "the mystery of mysteries, guarded at any cost by neighbour Brown from next door neighbour Green." pRlENDSHIP in ill-luck turns to mere acquaintance. The wine of life goes into vinegar, and folks that hugged the bottle, shirk the cruet. — A/\/\/V>— T N a large gathering on one occasion Douglas Jerrold found one man the centre of a deal of attraction, and on enquiring who it was he was informed that it was "Mr Mills of Manchester." "Oh,"repHed he, "I thought all the mills had stopped in Manchester." -^AAA''— CTRANGE is the love of woman: it's like one's beard — the closer one cuts it the stronger it grows — and both a plague. — v\/\/Vv— pXTINCT old virtues Douglas Jerrold likened to extinct volcanoes, with a strong memory of fire and brimstone. 176 Bon-Mots. TXT'HITE lies by frequent use become black ones. —^A/V\/\/~ /^N the carrying of Free Trade, Douglas Jerrold, an earnest free trader, immediately proposed the following epitaph for Protection — Here Lies PROTECTION : IT LIED THROUGHOUT ITS LIFE, AND NOW Lies Still. BREVITIES. pORTUNE is painted blind that she may not blush to behold the fools who belong to her. —^A/\/\/V— "piNE ladies who use excess of perfumes must think men like seals — most assailable at the nose. — ^AAA^' — COME men get on in the world on the same principle that a sweep passes uninterrupt- edly through a crowd. -wVW- — pEOPLE who affect a shortness of sight must think it the height of good fortune to be born blind. 178 Bon-Mots. T-JE who loses, in the search for fame, that dignity which should adorn human nature, is like the victim opera-singer, who has ex- changed manhood for sound. — A/VW-— T OUNGING, unemployed people may he called of the tribe of Joshua, for with them the sun stands still. r7ANATICS think men like bulls— they must be baited to madness ere they are in a fit condition to die. —A/\/\/\/^— 'T'HERE is an ancient saying; " Truth lies in a well." May not the modern adage run, " The most certain charity is at a pump? " —'•A/\/\rv— COME connoisseurs would give a hundred pounds for the painted head of a beggar, that would threaten the living mendicant with the stocks. — ^AAA/v^- 'X'HE friendship of some men is quite Briarean — thev have a hundred hands. Brevities. 179 TF you boast of a contempt for the world, avoid getting into debt. It is giving gnats the fangs of vipers. — A/\/vv^ — 'X'HE heart of the great man, surrounded by poverty and trammelled by dependence, is like an egg in a nest built among briers. It must either curdle into bitterness, or, if it take life and mount, struggle through thorns for the ascent. "pAME is represented bearing a trumpet. Would not the picture be truer were she to hold a handful of dust ? — 'AAA^^- piSHERMEN, in order to handle eels securely, first cover them with dirt. In like manner does detraction strive to grasp exxellence. —^AAjw- nPHE easy and temperate man is not he who is most valued by the world ; the virtue of his abstemiousness makes him an object of indifference. One of the gravest charges against the ass is — that he can live on thistles. i8o Bon-Mots. "\yW^ERE we determined resolutely to avoid vices — the world would foist them on us — as thieves put off their plunder on the guiltless, VX/HEN we look at the hide of a tiger in a furrier's shop, exposed to the gaze of every malapert, and then think of the ferocity of the living beast in his native jungle, we see a beadle before a magistrate — a magistrate before a minister. There is the skin of office — the sleekness without its claws. Brevities. i8i 'T'HE wounds of the dead are the furrows in which living heroes grow their laurels. TXyiTH some people political vacillation heightens a man's celebrity — just as the galleries applaud when an actor enters in a new dress. — A/\/\/\/^ — T F we judge from history, of what is the book of glory composed ? Are not its leaves dead men's skins — its letters stamped in human blood — its golden clasps the pillage of nations ? It is illuminated — with tears and broken hearts. FIRESIDE SAINTS. ST PATTY. CT PATTY was an orphan, and dwelt in a cot with a sour old aunt. It chanced, it being bitter cold, that three hunters came and craved for meat and drink. " Pack ! " said the sour aunt, ' ' neither meat nor drink have ye here." " Neither meat nor drink," said Patty, "but something better." And she ran and brought some milk, some eggs, and some flour, and beating them up, poured the batter in the pan. Then she took the pan and tossed the cake over ; and then a robin alighted at the window, and kept singing these words — 0?ie good turn deserves another. And Patty tossed and tossed the cakes ; and the hunters ate their fill and departed. And next day the hunter baron came in state to the cot ; and trumpets Fireside Saints. 183 were blown, and the heralds cried — One good turn deserves another ; in token whereof Patty became the baron's wife, and pancakes were eaten on Shrove Tuesday ever after. — A/\/\/V' — ST SALLY. QT SALLY, from her childhood, was known for her innermost love of truth. It was said of her that her heart was in a crystal shrine, and all the world might see it. Moreover, when other women denied, or strove to hide their age, St Sally said, ^^ I am ^ve-and-thirty.'' Where- upon next birthday, St Sally's husband, at a feast of all their friends, gave her a necklace of six-and-thirty opal beads ; and on every birth- day added a bead, until the beads mounted to fourscore and one. And the beads seemed to act as a charm ; for St Sally, wearing the sum of her age about her neck, age never appeared in her face. Such, in the olden time, was the reward of simplicity and truth. -^AIVV^— ST BETSY. CT Betsy was wedded to a knight who sailed with Raleigh and brought home tobacco ; and the knight smoked. But he thought that St Betsv, like other fine ladies of the court, would 1 84 Bon-Mots. fain that he should smoke out of doors, nor taint with 'bacco-smoke the tapestry. Wherje- upon the knight would seek his garden, his orchard, and in any weather smoke sub Jcwe. Now it chanced as the knight smoked, St Betsy came to him and said, " My lord, pray ye come into the house." And the knight went with St Betsy, who took him into a newly-cedared room, and said, " I pray my lord, henceforth smoke here : for is it not a shame that you, who are the foundation and the prop of your house, should have no place to put your head into and smoke?" And St Betsy led him to a chair, and with her own fingers filled him a pipe ; and from that time the knight sat in the cedar-chamber and smoked his weed. Fireside Saints. 185 ST PHILLIS. C T PHILLIS was a virgin of noble parentage, but withal as simple as any shepherdess of curds and cream. She married a wealthy lord, and had much pin-money. But when other ladies wore diamonds and pearls, St Phillis only wore a red and white rose in her hair. Yet her pin-money brought the best of jewellery in the happy eyes of the poor about her. St Phillis was rewarded. She lived until fourscore, and still carried the red and white rose in her face, and left their fragrance in her memory. — 'A/VW— ST PHCEBE. CT PHCEBE was married early to a wilful, but withal a good-hearted, husband. He was a merchant, and would come home sour and sullen from 'change. Whereupon after much pondering, St Phoebe in her patience, set to work, and praying the while, made of dyed lambs' wool a door-mat. And it chanced from that time, that never did the husband touch that mat that it didn't clean his temper with his shoes, and he sat down by his Phoebe as mild as the lamb whose wool he had trod upon. Thus gentleness may make miraculous door-mats ! i86 Bon-Mots. ST NORAH. CT NORAH was a poor girl, and came to England to service. Sweet-tempered and gentle,* she seemed to love everything she spoke to ; and she prayed to St Patrick that he would give her a good gift that would make her not proud, but useful ; and St Patrick, out of his own head, taught St Norah how to boil a potato — a sad thing, and to be lamented, that the secret has come down to so few. -^aAJV^ ST BECKY. A VERY good man was St Becky's husband, but with his heart a little too much in his bottle. Port wine — red port wine — was his de- light, and his constant cry was— bee's-wing. Now as he sat tipsy in his arbour, a wasp dropt into his glass, and the wasp was swallowed, stinging the man inwardly. Doctors crowded, and with much ado the man was saved. Now St Becky nursed her husband tenderly to health, and upbraided him not ; but she said these words, and they reformed him : — " Mj/ dear, take zvi7te, and bless your heart zuith it — but tvine in moderation : else, never forget that the bee s-wing of to-day becomes the ivasf s sting of to-morroiv.'''' Fireside Saints. 187 ST LILY. t^T LILY was the wife of a poor man, who tried to support his family — and the children were many — by writing books. But in those days it was not as easy for a man to find a publisher as to say his paternoster. Many were the books that were written by the husband of St Lily ; but to every book St Lily gave at least two babes. However, blithe as the cricket was the spirit that ruled about the hearth of St Lily. And how she helped her helpmate ! She smiled sunbeams into his ink- bottle, and turned his goose-pen to the quill of a dove ! She made the paper he wrote on as white as her name, and as fragrant as her soul. i88 Bon-Mots. And when folks wondered how St Lily managed so lightly with fortune's troubles, she always answered, that she never heeded them, for — troubles were like babies, and only grew the bigger by nursing. — WW'— ST FANNY. ^'T FANNY was a notable housewife. Her S house was a temple of neatness. Kmgs might have dined upon her staircase ! Now her great delight was to provide all things comfortable for her husband, a hard-working merchant, much abroad, but loving his home. Now one night he returned tired and hungry, and, by some mischance, there was nothing for supper. Shops were shut ; and great was the grief of St Fanny, Taking off a bracelet of seed-pearl, she said — " I'd give this ten times over for a supper for my husband/" And every pearl straightway became an oyster ; and St Fanny opened — the husband ate — and lo ! in every oyster was a pearl as big as a hazel-nut ; and so was St Fanny made rich for life. ST. DOLLY. A T an early age St Dolly showed the sweet- ness of her nature by her tender love for her widowed father, a baker dwelling at Pie- Fireside Saints. 189 corner, with a large family of little children. It chanced that with bad harvests bread became so dear, that of course bakers were ruined by high prices. The miller fell upon Dolly's father, and swept the shop with his golden thumb. Not a bed was left for the baker or his little ones. St Dolly slept upon a flour- sack, having prayed that good angels would help her to help her father. Now, sleeping, she dreamt that the oven was lighted, and she felt falling in a shower about her, raisins, currants, almonds, lemon-peel, flour, with heavy drops of brandy. Then in her dreams she saw the fairies gather up the things that fell, and knead them into a cake. They put the cake into the oven, and dancing round and round, the fairies vanished, crying, " Draiv the cake, Dolly — Dolly, draw the cake!'' And I90 Bon-Mots. Dolly awoke and drew the cake, and behold, it was the first twelfth-cake, sugared at the .top, and bearing the images of Faith, Hope, and Charity. Now this cake shown in the window came to the king's ear : and the king bought the cake, knighted the baker, and married Dolly to his grand falconer, to whom she proved a faithful and loving wife, bearing him a baker's dozen of lovely children. -wWVr— ST FLORENCE OR ST NIGHTINGALE. CT FLORENCE, by her works, had her *" lips blessed with comforting, and her hands touched with healing ; and she crossed the sea, and built hospitals, and solaced, and restored. And so long as English mistletoe gathers beneath it truthful hearts, and English holly brightens happy eyes, so long will English- men, at home or abroad, on land or on the wave — so long, in memory of that Eastern Christmas, will they cry —" God bless Sf Flore?ice.' Bless St Nightingale /" ST JENNY. C:T JENNY was wedded to a very poor man ; they had scarcely bread to keep them ; but Jenny was of so sweet a temper that even Fireside Saints. 191 want bore a bright face, and Jenny always smiled. In the worst seasons Jenny would spare crumbs for the birds, and sugar for the bees. Now it so happened that one autumn a storm rent their cot in twenty places apart ; when, behold, between the joists, from the basement to the roof, there was nothing but honeycomb and honey — a little fortune for St Jenny and her husband, in honey. Now some said it was the bees, but more declared it was the sweet temper of St Jenny that had filled the poor man's house with honey. PRINTED BY TURNBULL AND SPEARS EDINBURGH 5>^'^> ^./flK^.x UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY B 000 014 532 6