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They cut his bed-strings. They upset buckets and benches,
so that he might break his shins over them, which he
never failed to do. They sent him parcels, which, when
opened, were found to contain the paternal soap and
candles. There was no little fellow but had his jeer and
joke at Dobbin; and he bore everything quite patiently,
and was entirely dumb and miserable.
Cuff, on the contrary, was the great chief and dandy of
the Swishtail Seminary. He smuggled wine in. He fought
the town-boys. Ponies used to come for him to ride home
on Saturdays. He had his top-boots in his room, in which
he used to hunt in the holidays. He had a gold repeater:
and took snuff like the Doctor. He had been to the Opera,
and knew the merits of the principal actors, preferring
Mr. Kean to Mr. Kemble. He could knock you off forty
Latin verses in an hour. He could make French poetry.
What else didn't he know, or couldn't he do? They said
even the Doctor himself was afraid of him.
Cuff, the unquestioned king of the school, ruled over
his subjects, and bullied them, with splendid superiority.
This one blacked his shoes: that toasted his bread, others
would fag out, and give him balls at cricket during whole
summer afternoons. "Figs" was the fellow whom he
despised most, and with whom, though always abusing him,
and sneering at him, he scarcely ever condescended to
hold personal communication.
One day in private, the two young gentlemen had had
a difference. Figs, alone in the schoolroom, was
blundering over a home letter; when Cuff, entering,
bade him go upon some message, of which tarts were
probably the subject.
"I can't," says Dobbin; "I want to finish my letter."
"You CAN'T?" says Mr. Cuff, laying hold of that
document (in which many words were scratched out,
many were mis-spelt, on which had been spent I don't
know how much thought, and labour, and tears; for the
poor fellow was writing to his mother, who was fond of
him, although she was a grocer's wife, and lived in a back
parlour in Thames Street). "You CAN'T?" says Mr. Cuff:
"I should like to know why, pray? Can't you write to old
Mother Figs to-morrow?"
"Don't call names," Dobbin said, getting off the bench
very nervous.
"Well, sir, will you go?" crowed the cock of the school.
"Put down the letter," Dobbin replied; "no gentleman
readth letterth."
"Well, NOW will you go?" says the other.
"No, I won't. Don't strike, or I'll THMASH you," roars
out Dobbin, springing to a leaden inkstand, and looking
so wicked, that Mr. Cuff paused, turned down his coat
sleeves again, put his hands into his pockets, and walked
away with a sneer. But he never meddled.personally with
the grocer's boy after that; though we must do him the
justice to say he always spoke of Mr. Dobbin with con-
tempt behind his back.
Some time after this interview, it happened that Mr.
Cuff, on a sunshiny afternoon, was in the neighbourhood
of poor William Dobbin, who was lying under a tree in
the playground, spelling over a favourite copy of the
Arabian Nights which he had apart from the rest of the
school, who were pursuing their various sports--quite
lonely, and almost happy. If people would but leave
children to themselves; if teachers would cease to bully
them; if parents would not insist upon directing their
thoughts, and dominating their feelings--those feelings
and thoughts which are a mystery to all (for how much
do you and I know of each other, of our children, of our
fathers, of our neighbour, and how far more beautiful and
sacred are the thoughts of the poor lad or girl whom you
govern likely to be, than those of the dull and world-
corrupted person who rules him?)--if, I say, parents and
masters would leave their children alone a little more,
small harm would accrue, although a less quantity of
as in praesenti might be acquired.
Well, William Dobbin had for once forgotten the world,
and was away with Sindbad the Sailor in the Valley of
Diamonds, or with Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Peribanou
in that delightful cavern where the Prince found her, and
whither we should all like to make a tour; when shrill
cries, as of a little fellow weeping, woke up his pleasant
reverie; and looking up, he saw Cuff before him,
belabouring a little boy.
It was the lad who had peached upon him about the
grocer's cart; but he bore little malice, not at least
towards the young and small. "How dare you, sir, break
the bottle?" says Cuff to the little urchin, swinging a
yellow cricket-stump over him.
The boy had been instructed to get over the playground
wall (at a selected spot where the broken glass had been
removed from the top, and niches made convenient in
the brick); to run a quarter of a mile; to purchase a pint
of rum-shrub on credit; to brave all the Doctor's outlying
spies, and to clamber back into the playground again;
during the performance of which feat, his foot had slipt,
and the bottle was broken, and the shrub had been spilt,
and his pantaloons had been damaged, and he appeared
before his employer a perfectly guilty and trembling,
though harmless, wretch.
"How dare you, sir, break it?" says Cuff; "you blundering
little thief. You drank the shrub, and now you pretend
to have broken the bottle. Hold out your hand, sir."
Down came the stump with a great heavy thump on
the child's hand. A moan followed. Dobbin looked up.
The Fairy Peribanou had fled into the inmost cavern
with Prince Ahmed: the Roc had whisked away Sindbad
the Sailor out of the Valley of Diamonds out of sight, far
into the clouds: and there was everyday life before
honest William; and a big boy beating a little one
without cause.
"Hold out your other hand, sir," roars Cuff to his little
schoolfellow, whose face was distorted with pain.
Dobbin quivered, and gathered himself up in his narrow old
clothes.
"Take that, you little devil!" cried Mr. Cuff, and down
came the wicket again on the child's hand.--Don't be
horrified, ladies, every boy at a public school has done it.
Your children will so do and be done by, in all
probability. Down came the wicket again; and Dobbin
started up.
I can't tell what his motive was. Torture in a public
school is as much licensed as the knout in Russia. It
would be ungentlemanlike (in a manner) to resist it.
Perhaps Dobbin's foolish soul revolted against that exercise
of tyranny; or perhaps he had a hankering feeling of
revenge in his mind, and longed to measure himself
against that splendid bully and tyrant, who had all the
glory, pride, pomp, circumstance, banners flying, drums
beating, guards saluting, in the place. Whatever may have
been his incentive, however, up he sprang, and screamed
out, "Hold off, Cuff; don't bully that child any more; or
I'll--"
"Or you'll what?" Cuff asked in amazement at this
interruption. "Hold out your hand, you little beast."
"I'll give you the worst thrashing you ever had in your
life," Dobbin said, in reply to the first part of Cuff's
sentence; and little Osborne, gasping and in tears, looked
up with wonder and incredulity at seeing this amazing
champion put up suddenly to defend him: while Cuff's
astonishment was scarcely less. Fancy our late monarch
George III when he heard of the revolt of the North
American colonies: fancy brazen Goliath when little
David stepped forward and claimed a meeting; and you
have the feelings of Mr. Reginald Cuff when this
rencontre was proposed to him.
"After school," says he, of course; after a pause and a
look, as much as to say, "Make your will, and
communicate your last wishes to your friends
between this time and that."
"As you please," Dobbin said. "You must be my bottle
holder, Osborne."
"Well, if you like," little Osborne replied; for you see
his papa kept a carriage, and he was rather ashamed of
his champion.
Yes, when the hour of battle came, he was almost
ashamed to say, "Go it, Figs"; and not a single other boy
in the place uttered that cry for the first two or three
rounds of this famous combat; at the commencement of
which the scientific Cuff, with a contemptuous smile on
his face, and as light and as gay as if he was at a ball,
planted his blows upon his adversary, and floored that
unlucky champion three times running. At each fall there
was a cheer; and everybody was anxious to have the
honour of offering the conqueror a knee.
"What a licking I shall get when it's over," young
Osborne thought, picking up his man. "You'd best give in,"
he said to Dobbin; "it's only a thrashing, Figs, and you
know I'm used to it." But Figs, all whose limbs were in a
quiver, and whose nostrils were breathing rage, put his
little bottle-holder aside, and went in for a fourth time.
As he did not in the least know how to parry the blows
that were aimed at himself, and Cuff had begun the
attack on the three preceding occasions, without ever
allowing his enemy to strike, Figs now determined that he
would commence the engagement by a charge on his own
part; and accordingly, being a left-handed man, brought
that arm into action, and hit out a couple of times with
all his might--once at Mr. Cuff's left eye, and once on his
beautiful Roman nose.
Cuff went down this time, to the astonishment of the
assembly. "Well hit, by Jove," says little Osborne, with
the air of a connoisseur, clapping his man on the back.
"Give it him with the left, Figs my boy."
Figs's left made terrific play during all the rest of the
combat. Cuff went down every time. At the sixth round,
there were almost as many fellows shouting out, "Go it,
Figs," as there were youths exclaiming, "Go it, Cuff." At
the twelfth round the latter champion was all abroad, as
the saying is, and had lost all presence of mind and power
of attack or defence. Figs, on the contrary, was as calm
as a quaker. His face being quite pale, his eyes shining
open, and a great cut on his underlip bleeding profusely,
gave this young fellow a fierce and ghastly air, which
perhaps struck terror into many spectators. Nevertheless,
his intrepid adversary prepared to close for the
thirteenth time.
If I had the pen of a Napier, or a Bell's Life, I should
like to describe this combat properly. It was the last
charge of the Guard--(that is, it would have been, only
Waterloo had not yet taken place)--it was Ney's column
breasting the hill of La Haye Sainte, bristling with ten
thousand bayonets, and crowned with twenty eagles--it
was the shout of the beef-eating British, as leaping down
the hill they rushed to hug the enemy in the savage arms
of battle--in other words, Cuff coming up full of pluck,
but quite reeling and groggy, the Fig-merchant put in his
left as usual on his adversary's nose, and sent him down
for the last time.
"I think that will do for him," Figs said, as his opponent
dropped as neatly on the green as I have seen Jack
Spot's ball plump into the pocket at billiards; and the
fact is, when time was called, Mr. Reginald Cuff was not
able, or did not choose, to stand up again.
And now all the boys set up such a shout for Figs as
would have made you think he had been their darling
champion through the whole battle; and as absolutely
brought Dr. Swishtail out of his study, curious to know
the cause of the uproar. He threatened to flog Figs
violently, of course; but Cuff, who had come to himself
by this time, and was washing his wounds, stood up and
said, "It's my fault, sir--not Figs'--not Dobbin's. I was
bullying a little boy; and he served me right." By which
magnanimous speech he not only saved his conqueror a
whipping, but got back all his ascendancy over the boys
which his defeat had nearly cost him.
Young Osborne wrote home to his parents an account
of the transaction.
Sugarcane House, Richmond, March, 18--
DEAR MAMA,--I hope you are quite well. I should be
much obliged to you to send me a cake and five shillings.
There has been a fight here between Cuff & Dobbin.
Cuff, you know, was the Cock of the School. They
fought thirteen rounds, and Dobbin Licked. So Cuff is
now Only Second Cock. The fight was about me. Cuff
was licking me for breaking a bottle of milk, and Figs
wouldn't stand it. We call him Figs because his father is
a Grocer--Figs & Rudge, Thames St., City--I think as
he fought for me you ought to buy your Tea & Sugar
at his father's. Cuff goes home every Saturday, but can't
this, because he has 2 Black Eyes. He has a white Pony
to come and fetch him, and a groom in livery on a bay
mare. I wish my Papa would let me have a Pony, and I
am
Your dutiful Son,
GEORGE SEDLEY OSBORNE
P.S.--Give my love to little Emmy. I am cutting her
out a Coach in cardboard. Please not a seed-cake, but a
plum-cake.
In consequence of Dobbin's victory, his character rose
prodigiously in the estimation of all his schoolfellows, and
the name of Figs, which had been a byword of reproach,
became as respectable and popular a nickname as any
other in use in the school. "After all, it's not his fault
that his father's a grocer," George Osborne said, who,
though a little chap, had a very high popularity among
the Swishtail youth; and his opinion was received with
great applause. It was voted low to sneer at Dobbin
about this accident of birth. "Old Figs" grew to be a
name of kindness and endearment; and the sneak of an
usher jeered at him no longer.
And Dobbin's spirit rose with his altered circumstances.
He made wonderful advances in scholastic learning. The
superb Cuff himself, at whose condescension Dobbin
could only blush and wonder, helped him on with his
Latin verses; "coached" him in play-hours: carried him
triumphantly out of the little-boy class into the middle-
sized form; and even there got a fair place for him. It
was discovered, that although dull at classical learning,
at mathematics he was uncommonly quick. To the
contentment of all he passed third in algebra, and got a
French prize-book at the public Midsummer examination.
You should have seen his mother's face when Telemaque
(that delicious romance) was presented to him by
the Doctor in the face of the whole school and the parents
and company, with an inscription to Gulielmo Dobbin. All
the boys clapped hands in token of applause and
sympathy. His blushes, his stumbles, his awkwardness, and
the number of feet which he crushed as he went back to
his place, who shall describe or calculate? Old Dobbin, his
father, who now respected him for the first time, gave
him two guineas publicly; most of which he spent in a
general tuck-out for the school: and he came back in a
tail-coat after the holidays.
Dobbin was much too modest a young fellow to
suppose that this happy change in all his circumstances
arose from his own generous and manly disposition: he
chose, from some perverseness, to attribute his good
fortune to the sole agency and benevolence of little George
Osborne, to whom henceforth he vowed such a love and
affection as is only felt by children--such an affection, as
we read in the charming fairy-book, uncouth Orson had
for splendid young Valentine his conqueror. He flung
himself down at little Osborne's feet, and loved him.
Even before they were acquainted, he had admired
Osborne in secret. Now he was his valet, his dog, his man
Friday. He believed Osborne to be the possessor of
every perfection, to be the handsomest, the bravest, the
most active, the cleverest, the most generous of created
boys. He shared his money with him: bought him
uncountable presents of knives, pencil-cases, gold seals,
toffee, Little Warblers, and romantic books, with large
coloured pictures of knights and robbers, in many of which
latter you might read inscriptions to George Sedley
Osborne, Esquire, from his attached friend William Dobbin
--the which tokens of homage George received very
graciously, as became his superior merit.
So that Lieutenant Osborne, when coming to Russell
Square on the day of the Vauxhall party, said to the
ladies, "Mrs. Sedley, Ma'am, I hope you have room; I've
asked Dobbin of ours to come and dine here, and go with
us to Vauxhall. He's almost as modest as Jos."
"Modesty! pooh," said the stout gentleman, casting a
vainqueur look at Miss Sharp.
"He is--but you are incomparably more graceful,
Sedley," Osborne added, laughing. "I met him at the
Bedford, when I went to look for you; and I told him that
Miss Amelia was come home, and that we were all bent
on going out for a night's pleasuring; and that Mrs. Sedley
had forgiven his breaking the punch-bowl at the child's
party. Don't you remember the catastrophe, Ma'am, seven
years ago?"
"Over Mrs. Flamingo's crimson silk gown," said good-
natured Mrs. Sedley. "What a gawky it was! And his
sisters are not much more graceful. Lady Dobbin was at
Highbury last night with three of them. Such figures! my
dears."
"The Alderman's very rich, isn't he?" Osborne said
archly. "Don't you think one of the daughters would be a
good spec for me, Ma'am?"
"You foolish creature! Who would take you, I should
like to know, with your yellow face?"
"Mine a yellow face? Stop till you see Dobbin. Why, he
had the yellow fever three times; twice at Nassau, and
once at St. Kitts."
"Well, well; yours is quite yellow enough for us. Isn't
it, Emmy?" Mrs. Sedley said: at which speech Miss
Amelia only made a smile and a blush; and looking at Mr.
George Osborne's pale interesting countenance, and those
beautiful black, curling, shining whiskers, which the young
gentleman himself regarded with no ordinary
complacency, she thought in her little heart that in
His Majesty's army, or in the wide world, there never
was such a face or such a hero. "I don't care about Captain
Dobbin's complexion," she said, "or about his awkwardness.
I shall always like him, I know," her little reason being,
that he was the friend and champion of George.
"There's not a finer fellow in the service," Osborne
said, "nor a better officer, though he is not an Adonis,
certainly." And he looked towards the glass himself with
much naivete; and in so doing, caught Miss Sharp's eye
fixed keenly upon him, at which he blushed a little, and
Rebecca thought in her heart, "Ah, mon beau Monsieur!
I think I have YOUR gauge"--the little artful minx!
That evening, when Amelia came tripping into the
drawing-room in a white muslin frock, prepared for
conquest at Vauxhall, singing like a lark, and as fresh as a
rose--a very tall ungainly gentleman, with large hands
and feet, and large ears, set off by a closely cropped head
of black hair, and in the hideous military frogged coat
and cocked hat of those times, advanced to meet her, and
made her one of the clumsiest bows that was ever
performed by a mortal.
This was no other than Captain William Dobbin, of
His Majesty's Regiment of Foot, returned from
yellow fever, in the West Indies, to which the fortune
of the service had ordered his regiment, whilst so many
of his gallant comrades were reaping glory in the Peninsula.
He had arrived with a knock so very timid and quiet
that it was inaudible to the ladies upstairs: otherwise, you
may be sure Miss Amelia would never have been so bold
as to come singing into the room. As it was, the sweet
fresh little voice went right into the Captain's heart, and
nestled there. When she held out her hand for him to
shake, before he enveloped it in his own, he paused, and
thought--"Well, is it possible--are you the little maid I
remember in the pink frock, such a short time ago--the
night I upset the punch-bowl, just after I was gazetted?
Are you the little girl that George Osborne said should
marry him? What a blooming young creature you seem,
and what a prize the rogue has got!" All this he thought,
before he took Amelia's hand into his own, and as he let
his cocked hat fall.
His history since he left school, until the very moment
when we have the pleasure of meeting him again, although
not fully narrated, has yet, I think, been indicated
sufficiently for an ingenious reader by the conversation
in the last page. Dobbin, the despised grocer, was Alderman
Dobbin--Alderman Dobbin was Colonel of the City Light
Horse, then burning with military ardour to resist the
French Invasion. Colonel Dobbin's corps, in which old
Mr. Osborne himself was but an indifferent corporal, had
been reviewed by the Sovereign and the Duke of York;
and the colonel and alderman had been knighted. His
son had entered the army: and young Osborne followed
presently in the same regiment. They had served in the
West Indies and in Canada. Their regiment had just come
home, and the attachment of Dobbin to George Osborne
was as warm and generous now as it had been when the
two were schoolboys.
So these worthy people sat down to dinner presently.
They talked about war and glory, and Boney and Lord
Wellington, and the last Gazette. In those famous days
every gazette had a victory in it, and the two gallant young
men longed to see their own names in the glorious list,
and cursed their unlucky fate to belong to a regiment
which had been away from the chances of honour. Miss
Sharp kindled with this exciting talk, but Miss Sedley
trembled and grew quite faint as she heard it. Mr. Jos
told several of his tiger-hunting stories, finished the one
about Miss Cutler and Lance the surgeon; helped
Rebecca to everything on the table, and himself gobbled
and drank a great deal.
He sprang to open the door for the ladies, when they
retired, with the most killing grace--and coming back to
the table, filled himself bumper after bumper of claret,
which he swallowed with nervous rapidity.
"He's priming himself," Osborne whispered to Dobbin,
and at length the hour and the carriage arrived
for Vauxhall.
CHAPTER VI
Vauxhall
I know that the tune I am piping is a very mild
one (although there are some terrific chapters
coming presently), and must beg the good-natured
reader to remember that we are only discoursing
at present about a stockbroker's family in Russell
Square, who are taking walks, or luncheon, or dinner,
or talking and making love as people do in common life,
and without a single passionate and wonderful
incident to mark the progress of their loves. The
argument stands thus--Osborne, in love with Amelia,
has asked an old friend to dinner and to Vauxhall--Jos
Sedley is in love with Rebecca. Will he marry her?
That is the great subject now in hand.
We might have treated this subject in the genteel, or in
the romantic, or in the facetious manner. Suppose we had
laid the scene in Grosvenor Square, with the very same
adventures--would not some people have listened?
Suppose we had shown how Lord Joseph Sedley fell in love,
and the Marquis of Osborne became attached to Lady
Amelia, with the full consent of the Duke, her noble
father: or instead of the supremely genteel, suppose we
had resorted to the entirely low, and described what was
going on in Mr. Sedley's kitchen--how black Sambo was
in love with the cook (as indeed he was), and how he
fought a battle with the coachman in her behalf; how the
knife-boy was caught stealing a cold shoulder of mutton,
and Miss Sedley's new femme de chambre refused to go
to bed without a wax candle; such incidents might be
made to provoke much delightful laughter, and be
supposed to represent scenes of "life." Or if, on the contrary,
we had taken a fancy for the terrible, and made the lover
of the new femme de chambre a professional burglar, who
bursts into the house with his band, slaughters black
Sambo at the feet of his master, and carries off Amelia in
her night-dress, not to be let loose again till the third
volume, we should easily have constructed a tale of
thrilling interest, through the fiery chapters of which the
reader should hurry, panting. But my readers must hope
for no such romance, only a homely story, and must be
content with a chapter about Vauxhall, which is so short
that it scarce deserves to be called a chapter at all. And
yet it is a chapter, and a very important one too. Are not
there little chapters in everybody's life, that seem to be
nothing, and yet affect all the rest of the history?
Let us then step into the coach with the Russell Square
party, and be off to the Gardens. There is barely room
between Jos and Miss Sharp, who are on the front seat. Mr.
Osborne sitting bodkin opposite, between Captain Dobbin
and Amelia.
Every soul in the coach agreed that on that night Jos
would propose to make Rebecca Sharp Mrs. Sedley. The
parents at home had acquiesced in the arrangement,
though, between ourselves, old Mr. Sedley had a feeling
very much akin to contempt for his son. He said he was
vain, selfish, lazy, and effeminate. He could not endure his
airs as a man of fashion, and laughed heartily at his
pompous braggadocio stories. "I shall leave the fellow half
my property," he said; "and he will have, besides, plenty
of his own; but as I am perfectly sure that if you, and I,
and his sister were to die to-morrow, he would say 'Good
Gad!' and eat his dinner just as well as usual, I am not
going to make myself anxious about him. Let him marry
whom he likes. It's no affair of mine."
Amelia, on the other hand, as became a young woman
of her prudence and temperament, was quite enthusiastic
for the match. Once or twice Jos had been on the point
of saying something very important to her, to which she
was most willing to lend an ear, but the fat fellow could
not be brought to unbosom himself of his great secret,
and very much to his sister's disappointment he only rid
himself of a large sigh and turned away.
This mystery served to keep Amelia's gentle bosom in a
perpetual flutter of excitement. If she did not speak with
Rebecca on the tender subject, she compensated herself
with long and intimate conversations with Mrs. Blenkinsop,
the housekeeper, who dropped some hints to the
lady's-maid, who may have cursorily mentioned the matter
to the cook, who carried the news, I have no doubt, to all
the tradesmen, so that Mr. Jos's marriage was now talked
of by a very considerable number of persons in the
Russell Square world.
It was, of course, Mrs. Sedley's opinion that her son
would demean himself by a marriage with an artist's
daughter. "But, lor', Ma'am," ejaculated Mrs. Blenkinsop,
"we was only grocers when we married Mr. S., who
was a stock-broker's clerk, and we hadn't five hundred
pounds among us, and we're rich enough now." And
Amelia was entirely of this opinion, to which, gradually,
the good-natured Mrs. Sedley was brought.
Mr. Sedley was neutral. "Let Jos marry whom he likes,"
he said; "it's no affair of mine. This girl has no fortune;
no more had Mrs. Sedley. She seems good-humoured and
clever, and will keep him in order, perhaps. Better she,
my dear, than a black Mrs. Sedley, and a dozen of
mahogany grandchildren."
So that everything seemed to smile upon Rebecca's
fortunes. She took Jos's arm, as a matter of course, on going
to dinner; she had sate by him on the box of his open
carriage (a most tremendous "buck" he was, as he sat
there, serene, in state, driving his greys), and though
nobody said a word on the subject of the marriage,
everybody seemed to understand it. All she wanted was
the proposal, and ah! how Rebecca now felt the want of a
mother!--a dear, tender mother, who would have managed
the business in ten minutes, and, in the course of a little
delicate confidential conversation, would have extracted
the interesting avowal from the bashful lips of the young
man!
Such was the state of affairs as the carriage crossed
Westminster bridge.
The party was landed at the Royal Gardens in due time.
As the majestic Jos stepped out of the creaking vehicle
the crowd gave a cheer for the fat gentleman, who blushed
and looked very big and mighty, as he walked away with
Rebecca under his arm. George, of course, took charge of
Amelia. She looked as happy as a rose-tree in sunshine.
"I say, Dobbin," says George, "just look to the shawls
and things, there's a good fellow." And so while he paired
off with Miss Sedley, and Jos squeezed through the gate
into the gardens with Rebecca at his side, honest Dobbin
contented himself by giving an arm to the shawls, and by
paying at the door for the whole party.
He walked very modestly behind them. He was not
willing to spoil sport. About Rebecca and Jos he did not
care a fig. But he thought Amelia worthy even of the
brilliant George Osborne, and as he saw that good-looking
couple threading the walks to the girl's delight and
wonder, he watched her artless happiness with a sort of
fatherly pleasure. Perhaps he felt that he would have liked
to have something on his own arm besides a shawl (the
people laughed at seeing the gawky young officer carrying
this female burthen); but William Dobbin was very little
addicted to selfish calculation at all; and so long as his
friend was enjoying himself, how should he be discontented?
And the truth is, that of all the delights of the
Gardens; of the hundred thousand extra lamps, which
were always lighted; the fiddlers in cocked hats, who
played ravishing melodies under the gilded cockle-shell in
the midst of the gardens; the singers, both of comic and
sentimental ballads, who charmed the ears there; the
country dances, formed by bouncing cockneys and
cockneyesses, and executed amidst jumping, thumping and
laughter; the signal which announced that Madame Saqui
was about to mount skyward on a slack-rope ascending
to the stars; the hermit that always sat in the illuminated
hermitage; the dark walks, so favourable to the interviews
of young lovers; the pots of stout handed about by the
people in the shabby old liveries; and the twinkling boxes,
in which the happy feasters made-believe to eat slices of
almost invisible ham--of all these things, and of the
gentle Simpson, that kind smiling idiot, who, I daresay,
presided even then over the place--Captain William Dobbin
did not take the slightest notice.
He carried about Amelia's white cashmere shawl, and
having attended under the gilt cockle-shell, while Mrs.
Salmon performed the Battle of Borodino (a savage
cantata against the Corsican upstart, who had lately met
with his Russian reverses)--Mr. Dobbin tried to hum it
as he walked away, and found he was humming--the tune
which Amelia Sedley sang on the stairs, as she came
down to dinner.
He burst out laughing at himself; for the truth is, he
could sing no better than an owl.
It is to be understood, as a matter of course, that our
young people, being in parties of two and two, made the
most solemn promises to keep together during the evening,
and separated in ten minutes afterwards. Parties at
Vauxhall always did separate, but 'twas only to meet
again at supper-time, when they could talk of their mutual
adventures in the interval.
What were the adventures of Mr. Osborne and Miss
Amelia? That is a secret. But be sure of this--they were
perfectly happy, and correct in their behaviour; and as
they had been in the habit of being together any time these
fifteen years, their tete-a-tete offered no particular
novelty.
But when Miss Rebecca Sharp and her stout companion
lost themselves in a solitary walk, in which there were not
above five score more of couples similarly straying, they
both felt that the situation was extremely tender and
critical, and now or never was the moment Miss Sharp
thought, to provoke that declaration which was trembling
on the timid lips of Mr. Sedley. They had previously been
to the panorama of Moscow, where a rude fellow, treading
on Miss Sharp's foot, caused her to fall back with a little
shriek into the arms of Mr. Sedley, and this little incident
increased the tenderness and confidence of that gentleman
to such a degree, that he told her several of his favourite
Indian stories over again for, at least, the sixth time.
"How I should like to see India!" said Rebecca.
"SHOULD you?" said Joseph, with a most killing tenderness;
and was no doubt about to follow up this artful
interrogatory by a question still more tender (for he puffed
and panted a great deal, and Rebecca's hand, which was
placed near his heart, could count the feverish pulsations
of that organ), when, oh, provoking! the bell rang for the
fireworks, and, a great scuffling and running taking place,
these interesting lovers were obliged to follow in the
stream of people.
Captain Dobbin had some thoughts of joining the party
at supper: as, in truth, he found the Vauxhall
amusements not particularly lively--but he paraded
twice before the box where the now united couples were
met, and nobody took any notice of him. Covers were laid for
four. The mated pairs were prattling away quite happily,
and Dobbin knew he was as clean forgotten as if he had
never existed in this world.
"I should only be de trop," said the Captain, looking at
them rather wistfully. "I'd best go and talk to the hermit,"
--and so he strolled off out of the hum of men, and noise,
and clatter of the banquet, into the dark walk, at the end
of which lived that well-known pasteboard Solitary. It
wasn't very good fun for Dobbin--and, indeed, to be
alone at Vauxhall, I have found, from my own experience,
to be one of the most dismal sports ever entered into by a
bachelor.
The two couples were perfectly happy then in their
box: where the most delightful and intimate conversation
took place. Jos was in his glory, ordering about the waiters
with great majesty. He made the salad; and uncorked
the Champagne; and carved the chickens; and ate and
drank the greater part of the refreshments on the tables.
Finally, he insisted upon having a bowl of rack punch;
everybody had rack punch at Vauxhall. "Waiter, rack
punch."
That bowl of rack punch was the cause of all this
history. And why not a bowl of rack punch as well as any
other cause? Was not a bowl of prussic acid the cause of
Fair Rosamond's retiring from the world? Was not a bowl
of wine the cause of the demise of Alexander the Great,
or, at least, does not Dr. Lempriere say so?--so did this
bowl of rack punch influence the fates of all the principal
characters in this "Novel without a Hero," which we are
now relating. It influenced their life, although most of
them did not taste a drop of it.
The young ladies did not drink it; Osborne did not
like it; and the consequence was that Jos, that fat
gourmand, drank up the whole contents of the bowl;
and the consequence of his drinking up the whole contents
of the bowl was a liveliness which at first was astonishing,
and then became almost painful; for he talked and laughed so
loud as to bring scores of listeners round the box, much
to the confusion of the innocent party within it; and,
volunteering to sing a song (which he did in that maudlin
high key peculiar to gentlemen in an inebriated state), he
almost drew away the audience who were gathered round
the musicians in the gilt scollop-shell, and received from
his hearers a great deal of applause.
"Brayvo, Fat un!" said one; "Angcore, Daniel Lambert!"
said another; "What a figure for the tight-rope!"
exclaimed another wag, to the inexpressible alarm of
the ladies, and the great anger of Mr. Osborne.
"For Heaven's sake, Jos, let us get up and go," cried
that gentleman, and the young women rose.
"Stop, my dearest diddle-diddle-darling," shouted Jos,
now as bold as a lion, and clasping Miss Rebecca round
the waist. Rebecca started, but she could not get away her
hand. The laughter outside redoubled. Jos continued to
drink, to make love, and to sing; and, winking and waving
his glass gracefully to his audience, challenged all or any
to come in and take a share of his punch.
Mr. Osborne was just on the point of knocking down a
gentleman in top-boots, who proposed to take advantage
of this invitation, and a commotion seemed to be
inevitable, when by the greatest good luck a gentleman
of the name of Dobbin, who had been walking about the
gardens, stepped up to the box. "Be off, you fools!" said
this gentleman--shouldering off a great number of the crowd,
who vanished presently before his cocked hat and fierce
appearance--and he entered the box in a most agitated state.
"Good Heavens! Dobbin, where have you been?" 0sborne
said, seizing the white cashmere shawl from his
friend's arm, and huddling up Amelia in it.--"Make
yourself useful, and take charge of Jos here, whilst I
take the ladies to the carriage."
Jos was for rising to interfere--but a single push from
Osborne's finger sent him puffing back into his seat again,
and the lieutenant was enabled to remove the ladies in
safety. Jos kissed his hand to them as they retreated, and
hiccupped out "Bless you! Bless you!" Then, seizing
Captain Dobbin's hand, and weeping in the most pitiful way,
he confided to that gentleman the secret of his loves. He
adored that girl who had just gone out; he had broken
her heart, he knew he had, by his conduct; he would marry
her next morning at St. George's, Hanover Square; he'd
knock up the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth: he
would, by Jove! and have him in readiness; and, acting on
this hint, Captain Dobbin shrewdly induced him to leave
the gardens and hasten to Lambeth Palace, and, when once
out of the gates, easily conveyed Mr. Jos Sedley into a
hackney-coach, which deposited him safely at his lodgings.
George Osborne conducted the girls home in safety:
and when the door was closed upon them, and as he
walked across Russell Square, laughed so as to astonish
the watchman. Amelia looked very ruefully at her friend,
as they went up stairs, and kissed her, and went to bed
without any more talking.
"He must propose to-morrow," thought Rebecca. "He
called me his soul's darling, four times; he squeezed my
hand in Amelia's presence. He must propose to-morrow."
And so thought Amelia, too. And I dare say she thought
of the dress she was to wear as bridesmaid, and of the
presents which she should make to her nice little sister-in-
law, and of a subsequent ceremony in which she herself
might play a principal part, &c., and &c., and &c., and &c.
Oh, ignorant young creatures! How little do you know
the effect of rack punch! What is the rack in the punch,
at night, to the rack in the head of a morning? To this
truth I can vouch as a man; there is no headache in the
world like that caused by Vauxhall punch. Through the
lapse of twenty years, I can remember the consequence
of two glasses! two wine-glasses! but two, upon the
honour of a gentleman; and Joseph Sedley, who had a
liver complaint, had swallowed at least a quart of the
abominable mixture.
That next morning, which Rebecca thought was to
dawn upon her fortune, found Sedley groaning in agonies
which the pen refuses to describe. Soda-water was not
invented yet. Small beer--will it be believed!--was the
only drink with which unhappy gentlemen soothed the
fever of their previous night's potation. With this mild
beverage before him, George Osborne found the ex-
Collector of Boggley Wollah groaning on the sofa at
his lodgings. Dobbin was already in the room, good-
naturedly tending his patient of the night before. The two
officers, looking at the prostrate Bacchanalian, and
askance at each other, exchanged the most frightful
sympathetic grins. Even Sedley's valet, the most solemn
and correct of gentlemen, with the muteness and gravity of
an undertaker, could hardly keep his countenance in
order, as he looked at his unfortunate master.
"Mr. Sedley was uncommon wild last night, sir," he
whispered in confidence to Osborne, as the latter mounted
the stair. "He wanted to fight the 'ackney-coachman, sir.
The Capting was obliged to bring him upstairs in his
harms like a babby." A momentary smile flickered over
Mr. Brush's features as he spoke; instantly, however, they
relapsed into their usual unfathomable calm, as he flung
open the drawing-room door, and announced "Mr.
Hosbin."
"How are you, Sedley?" that young wag began, after
surveying his victim. "No bones broke? There's a
hackney-coachman downstairs with a black eye, and a
tied-up head, vowing he'll have the law of you."
"What do you mean--law?" Sedley faintly asked.
"For thrashing him last night--didn't he, Dobbin? You
hit out, sir, like Molyneux. The watchman says he never
saw a fellow go down so straight. Ask Dobbin."
"You DID have a round with the coachman," Captain
Dobbin said, "and showed plenty of fight too."
"And that fellow with the white coat at Vauxhall! How
Jos drove at him! How the women screamed! By Jove,
sir, it did my heart good to see you. I thought you civilians
had no pluck; but I'll never get in your way when you
are in your cups, Jos."
"I believe I'm very terrible, when I'm roused,"
ejaculated Jos from the sofa, and made a grimace so
dreary and ludicrous, that the Captain's politeness could
restrain him no longer, and he and Osborne fired off a
ringing volley of laughter.
Osborne pursued his advantage pitilessly. He thought
Jos a milksop. He had been revolving in his mind the
marriage question pending between Jos and Rebecca, and
was not over well pleased that a member of a family into
which he, George Osborne, of the --th, was going
to marry, should make a mesalliance with a little nobody
--a little upstart governess. "You hit, you poor old
fellow!" said Osborne. "You terrible! Why, man, you
couldn't stand--you made everybody laugh in the
Gardens, though you were crying yourself. You were
maudlin, Jos. Don't you remember singing a song?"
"A what?" Jos asked.
"A sentimental song, and calling Rosa, Rebecca, what's
her name, Amelia's little friend--your dearest diddle-
diddle-darling?" And this ruthless young fellow, seizing
hold of Dobbin's hand, acted over the scene, to the horror
of the original performer, and in spite of Dobbin's good-
natured entreaties to him to have mercy.
"Why should I spare him?" Osborne said to his friend's
remonstrances, when they quitted the invalid, leaving him
under the hands of Doctor Gollop. "What the deuce right
has he to give himself his patronizing airs, and make fools
of us at Vauxhall? Who's this little schoolgirl that is
ogling and making love to him? Hang it, the family's
low enough already, without HER. A governess is all very
well, but I'd rather have a lady for my sister-in-law. I'm
a liberal man; but I've proper pride, and know my own
station: let her know hers. And I'll take down that great
hectoring Nabob, and prevent him from being made a
greater fool than he is. That's why I told him to look out,
lest she brought an action against him."
"I suppose you know best," Dobbin said, though rather
dubiously. "You always were a Tory, and your family's
one of the oldest in England. But --"
"Come and see the girls, and make love to Miss Sharp
yourself," the lieutenant here interrupted his friend; but
Captain Dobbin declined to join Osborne in his daily visit
to the young ladies in Russell Square.
As George walked down Southampton Row, from
Holborn, he laughed as he saw, at the Sedley Mansion,
in two different stories two heads on the look-out.
The fact is, Miss Amelia, in the drawing-room balcony,
was looking very eagerly towards the opposite side of the
Square, where Mr. Osborne dwelt, on the watch for the
lieutenant himself; and Miss Sharp, from her little bed-
room on the second floor, was in observation until Mr.
Joseph's great form should heave in sight.
"Sister Anne is on the watch-tower," said he to Amelia,
"but there's nobody coming"; and laughing and enjoying
the joke hugely, he described in the most ludicrous terms
to Miss Sedley, the dismal condition of her brother.
"I think it's very cruel of you to laugh, George," she
said, looking particularly unhappy; but George only
laughed the more at her piteous and discomfited mien,
persisted in thinking the joke a most diverting one, and
when Miss Sharp came downstairs, bantered her with a
great deal of liveliness upon the effect of her charms on
the fat civilian.
"O Miss Sharp! if you could but see him this morning,"
he said--"moaning in his flowered dressing-gown--
writhing on his sofa; if you could but have seen him
lolling out his tongue to Gollop the apothecary."
"See whom?" said Miss Sharp.
"Whom? O whom? Captain Dobbin, of course, to whom
we were all so attentive, by the way, last night."
"We were very unkind to him," Emmy said, blushing
very much. "I--I quite forgot him."
"Of course you did," cried Osborne, still on the laugh.
"One can't be ALWAYS thinking about Dobbin, you know,
Amelia. Can one, Miss Sharp?"
"Except when he overset the glass of wine at dinner,"
Miss Sharp said, with a haughty air and a toss of the
head, "I never gave the existence of Captain Dobbin one
single moment's consideration."
"Very good, Miss Sharp, I'll tell him," Osborne said;
and as he spoke Miss Sharp began to have a feeling of
distrust and hatred towards this young officer, which he
was quite unconscious of having inspired. "He is to make
fun of me, is he?" thought Rebecca. "Has he been
laughing about me to Joseph? Has he frightened him?
Perhaps he won't come."--A film passed over her eyes,
and her heart beat quite quick.
"You're always joking," said she, smiling as innocently
as she could. "Joke away, Mr. George; there's nobody
to defend ME." And George Osborne, as she walked away
--and Amelia looked reprovingly at him--felt some little
manly compunction for having inflicted any unnecessary
unkindness upon this helpless creature. "My dearest
Amelia," said he, "you are too good--too kind. You
don't know the world. I do. And your little friend Miss
Sharp must learn her station."
"Don't you think Jos will--"
"Upon my word, my dear, I don't know. He may, or
may not. I'm not his master. I only know he is a very
foolish vain fellow, and put my dear little girl into a very
painful and awkward position last night. My dearest
diddle-diddle-darling!" He was off laughing again, and he
did it so drolly that Emmy laughed too.
All that day Jos never came. But Amelia had no fear
about this; for the little schemer had actually sent away
the page, Mr. Sambo's aide-de-camp, to Mr. Joseph's
lodgings, to ask for some book he had promised, and how
he was; and the reply through Jos's man, Mr. Brush, was,
so that he might break his shins over them, which he
never failed to do. They sent him parcels, which, when
opened, were found to contain the paternal soap and
candles. There was no little fellow but had his jeer and
joke at Dobbin; and he bore everything quite patiently,
and was entirely dumb and miserable.
Cuff, on the contrary, was the great chief and dandy of
the Swishtail Seminary. He smuggled wine in. He fought
the town-boys. Ponies used to come for him to ride home
on Saturdays. He had his top-boots in his room, in which
he used to hunt in the holidays. He had a gold repeater:
and took snuff like the Doctor. He had been to the Opera,
and knew the merits of the principal actors, preferring
Mr. Kean to Mr. Kemble. He could knock you off forty
Latin verses in an hour. He could make French poetry.
What else didn't he know, or couldn't he do? They said
even the Doctor himself was afraid of him.
Cuff, the unquestioned king of the school, ruled over
his subjects, and bullied them, with splendid superiority.
This one blacked his shoes: that toasted his bread, others
would fag out, and give him balls at cricket during whole
summer afternoons. "Figs" was the fellow whom he
despised most, and with whom, though always abusing him,
and sneering at him, he scarcely ever condescended to
hold personal communication.
One day in private, the two young gentlemen had had
a difference. Figs, alone in the schoolroom, was
blundering over a home letter; when Cuff, entering,
bade him go upon some message, of which tarts were
probably the subject.
"I can't," says Dobbin; "I want to finish my letter."
"You CAN'T?" says Mr. Cuff, laying hold of that
document (in which many words were scratched out,
many were mis-spelt, on which had been spent I don't
know how much thought, and labour, and tears; for the
poor fellow was writing to his mother, who was fond of
him, although she was a grocer's wife, and lived in a back
parlour in Thames Street). "You CAN'T?" says Mr. Cuff:
"I should like to know why, pray? Can't you write to old
Mother Figs to-morrow?"
"Don't call names," Dobbin said, getting off the bench
very nervous.
"Well, sir, will you go?" crowed the cock of the school.
"Put down the letter," Dobbin replied; "no gentleman
readth letterth."
"Well, NOW will you go?" says the other.
"No, I won't. Don't strike, or I'll THMASH you," roars
out Dobbin, springing to a leaden inkstand, and looking
so wicked, that Mr. Cuff paused, turned down his coat
sleeves again, put his hands into his pockets, and walked
away with a sneer. But he never meddled.personally with
the grocer's boy after that; though we must do him the
justice to say he always spoke of Mr. Dobbin with con-
tempt behind his back.
Some time after this interview, it happened that Mr.
Cuff, on a sunshiny afternoon, was in the neighbourhood
of poor William Dobbin, who was lying under a tree in
the playground, spelling over a favourite copy of the
Arabian Nights which he had apart from the rest of the
school, who were pursuing their various sports--quite
lonely, and almost happy. If people would but leave
children to themselves; if teachers would cease to bully
them; if parents would not insist upon directing their
thoughts, and dominating their feelings--those feelings
and thoughts which are a mystery to all (for how much
do you and I know of each other, of our children, of our
fathers, of our neighbour, and how far more beautiful and
sacred are the thoughts of the poor lad or girl whom you
govern likely to be, than those of the dull and world-
corrupted person who rules him?)--if, I say, parents and
masters would leave their children alone a little more,
small harm would accrue, although a less quantity of
as in praesenti might be acquired.
Well, William Dobbin had for once forgotten the world,
and was away with Sindbad the Sailor in the Valley of
Diamonds, or with Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Peribanou
in that delightful cavern where the Prince found her, and
whither we should all like to make a tour; when shrill
cries, as of a little fellow weeping, woke up his pleasant
reverie; and looking up, he saw Cuff before him,
belabouring a little boy.
It was the lad who had peached upon him about the
grocer's cart; but he bore little malice, not at least
towards the young and small. "How dare you, sir, break
the bottle?" says Cuff to the little urchin, swinging a
yellow cricket-stump over him.
The boy had been instructed to get over the playground
wall (at a selected spot where the broken glass had been
removed from the top, and niches made convenient in
the brick); to run a quarter of a mile; to purchase a pint
of rum-shrub on credit; to brave all the Doctor's outlying
spies, and to clamber back into the playground again;
during the performance of which feat, his foot had slipt,
and the bottle was broken, and the shrub had been spilt,
and his pantaloons had been damaged, and he appeared
before his employer a perfectly guilty and trembling,
though harmless, wretch.
"How dare you, sir, break it?" says Cuff; "you blundering
little thief. You drank the shrub, and now you pretend
to have broken the bottle. Hold out your hand, sir."
Down came the stump with a great heavy thump on
the child's hand. A moan followed. Dobbin looked up.
The Fairy Peribanou had fled into the inmost cavern
with Prince Ahmed: the Roc had whisked away Sindbad
the Sailor out of the Valley of Diamonds out of sight, far
into the clouds: and there was everyday life before
honest William; and a big boy beating a little one
without cause.
"Hold out your other hand, sir," roars Cuff to his little
schoolfellow, whose face was distorted with pain.
Dobbin quivered, and gathered himself up in his narrow old
clothes.
"Take that, you little devil!" cried Mr. Cuff, and down
came the wicket again on the child's hand.--Don't be
horrified, ladies, every boy at a public school has done it.
Your children will so do and be done by, in all
probability. Down came the wicket again; and Dobbin
started up.
I can't tell what his motive was. Torture in a public
school is as much licensed as the knout in Russia. It
would be ungentlemanlike (in a manner) to resist it.
Perhaps Dobbin's foolish soul revolted against that exercise
of tyranny; or perhaps he had a hankering feeling of
revenge in his mind, and longed to measure himself
against that splendid bully and tyrant, who had all the
glory, pride, pomp, circumstance, banners flying, drums
beating, guards saluting, in the place. Whatever may have
been his incentive, however, up he sprang, and screamed
out, "Hold off, Cuff; don't bully that child any more; or
I'll--"
"Or you'll what?" Cuff asked in amazement at this
interruption. "Hold out your hand, you little beast."
"I'll give you the worst thrashing you ever had in your
life," Dobbin said, in reply to the first part of Cuff's
sentence; and little Osborne, gasping and in tears, looked
up with wonder and incredulity at seeing this amazing
champion put up suddenly to defend him: while Cuff's
astonishment was scarcely less. Fancy our late monarch
George III when he heard of the revolt of the North
American colonies: fancy brazen Goliath when little
David stepped forward and claimed a meeting; and you
have the feelings of Mr. Reginald Cuff when this
rencontre was proposed to him.
"After school," says he, of course; after a pause and a
look, as much as to say, "Make your will, and
communicate your last wishes to your friends
between this time and that."
"As you please," Dobbin said. "You must be my bottle
holder, Osborne."
"Well, if you like," little Osborne replied; for you see
his papa kept a carriage, and he was rather ashamed of
his champion.
Yes, when the hour of battle came, he was almost
ashamed to say, "Go it, Figs"; and not a single other boy
in the place uttered that cry for the first two or three
rounds of this famous combat; at the commencement of
which the scientific Cuff, with a contemptuous smile on
his face, and as light and as gay as if he was at a ball,
planted his blows upon his adversary, and floored that
unlucky champion three times running. At each fall there
was a cheer; and everybody was anxious to have the
honour of offering the conqueror a knee.
"What a licking I shall get when it's over," young
Osborne thought, picking up his man. "You'd best give in,"
he said to Dobbin; "it's only a thrashing, Figs, and you
know I'm used to it." But Figs, all whose limbs were in a
quiver, and whose nostrils were breathing rage, put his
little bottle-holder aside, and went in for a fourth time.
As he did not in the least know how to parry the blows
that were aimed at himself, and Cuff had begun the
attack on the three preceding occasions, without ever
allowing his enemy to strike, Figs now determined that he
would commence the engagement by a charge on his own
part; and accordingly, being a left-handed man, brought
that arm into action, and hit out a couple of times with
all his might--once at Mr. Cuff's left eye, and once on his
beautiful Roman nose.
Cuff went down this time, to the astonishment of the
assembly. "Well hit, by Jove," says little Osborne, with
the air of a connoisseur, clapping his man on the back.
"Give it him with the left, Figs my boy."
Figs's left made terrific play during all the rest of the
combat. Cuff went down every time. At the sixth round,
there were almost as many fellows shouting out, "Go it,
Figs," as there were youths exclaiming, "Go it, Cuff." At
the twelfth round the latter champion was all abroad, as
the saying is, and had lost all presence of mind and power
of attack or defence. Figs, on the contrary, was as calm
as a quaker. His face being quite pale, his eyes shining
open, and a great cut on his underlip bleeding profusely,
gave this young fellow a fierce and ghastly air, which
perhaps struck terror into many spectators. Nevertheless,
his intrepid adversary prepared to close for the
thirteenth time.
If I had the pen of a Napier, or a Bell's Life, I should
like to describe this combat properly. It was the last
charge of the Guard--(that is, it would have been, only
Waterloo had not yet taken place)--it was Ney's column
breasting the hill of La Haye Sainte, bristling with ten
thousand bayonets, and crowned with twenty eagles--it
was the shout of the beef-eating British, as leaping down
the hill they rushed to hug the enemy in the savage arms
of battle--in other words, Cuff coming up full of pluck,
but quite reeling and groggy, the Fig-merchant put in his
left as usual on his adversary's nose, and sent him down
for the last time.
"I think that will do for him," Figs said, as his opponent
dropped as neatly on the green as I have seen Jack
Spot's ball plump into the pocket at billiards; and the
fact is, when time was called, Mr. Reginald Cuff was not
able, or did not choose, to stand up again.
And now all the boys set up such a shout for Figs as
would have made you think he had been their darling
champion through the whole battle; and as absolutely
brought Dr. Swishtail out of his study, curious to know
the cause of the uproar. He threatened to flog Figs
violently, of course; but Cuff, who had come to himself
by this time, and was washing his wounds, stood up and
said, "It's my fault, sir--not Figs'--not Dobbin's. I was
bullying a little boy; and he served me right." By which
magnanimous speech he not only saved his conqueror a
whipping, but got back all his ascendancy over the boys
which his defeat had nearly cost him.
Young Osborne wrote home to his parents an account
of the transaction.
Sugarcane House, Richmond, March, 18--
DEAR MAMA,--I hope you are quite well. I should be
much obliged to you to send me a cake and five shillings.
There has been a fight here between Cuff & Dobbin.
Cuff, you know, was the Cock of the School. They
fought thirteen rounds, and Dobbin Licked. So Cuff is
now Only Second Cock. The fight was about me. Cuff
was licking me for breaking a bottle of milk, and Figs
wouldn't stand it. We call him Figs because his father is
a Grocer--Figs & Rudge, Thames St., City--I think as
he fought for me you ought to buy your Tea & Sugar
at his father's. Cuff goes home every Saturday, but can't
this, because he has 2 Black Eyes. He has a white Pony
to come and fetch him, and a groom in livery on a bay
mare. I wish my Papa would let me have a Pony, and I
am
Your dutiful Son,
GEORGE SEDLEY OSBORNE
P.S.--Give my love to little Emmy. I am cutting her
out a Coach in cardboard. Please not a seed-cake, but a
plum-cake.
In consequence of Dobbin's victory, his character rose
prodigiously in the estimation of all his schoolfellows, and
the name of Figs, which had been a byword of reproach,
became as respectable and popular a nickname as any
other in use in the school. "After all, it's not his fault
that his father's a grocer," George Osborne said, who,
though a little chap, had a very high popularity among
the Swishtail youth; and his opinion was received with
great applause. It was voted low to sneer at Dobbin
about this accident of birth. "Old Figs" grew to be a
name of kindness and endearment; and the sneak of an
usher jeered at him no longer.
And Dobbin's spirit rose with his altered circumstances.
He made wonderful advances in scholastic learning. The
superb Cuff himself, at whose condescension Dobbin
could only blush and wonder, helped him on with his
Latin verses; "coached" him in play-hours: carried him
triumphantly out of the little-boy class into the middle-
sized form; and even there got a fair place for him. It
was discovered, that although dull at classical learning,
at mathematics he was uncommonly quick. To the
contentment of all he passed third in algebra, and got a
French prize-book at the public Midsummer examination.
You should have seen his mother's face when Telemaque
(that delicious romance) was presented to him by
the Doctor in the face of the whole school and the parents
and company, with an inscription to Gulielmo Dobbin. All
the boys clapped hands in token of applause and
sympathy. His blushes, his stumbles, his awkwardness, and
the number of feet which he crushed as he went back to
his place, who shall describe or calculate? Old Dobbin, his
father, who now respected him for the first time, gave
him two guineas publicly; most of which he spent in a
general tuck-out for the school: and he came back in a
tail-coat after the holidays.
Dobbin was much too modest a young fellow to
suppose that this happy change in all his circumstances
arose from his own generous and manly disposition: he
chose, from some perverseness, to attribute his good
fortune to the sole agency and benevolence of little George
Osborne, to whom henceforth he vowed such a love and
affection as is only felt by children--such an affection, as
we read in the charming fairy-book, uncouth Orson had
for splendid young Valentine his conqueror. He flung
himself down at little Osborne's feet, and loved him.
Even before they were acquainted, he had admired
Osborne in secret. Now he was his valet, his dog, his man
Friday. He believed Osborne to be the possessor of
every perfection, to be the handsomest, the bravest, the
most active, the cleverest, the most generous of created
boys. He shared his money with him: bought him
uncountable presents of knives, pencil-cases, gold seals,
toffee, Little Warblers, and romantic books, with large
coloured pictures of knights and robbers, in many of which
latter you might read inscriptions to George Sedley
Osborne, Esquire, from his attached friend William Dobbin
--the which tokens of homage George received very
graciously, as became his superior merit.
So that Lieutenant Osborne, when coming to Russell
Square on the day of the Vauxhall party, said to the
ladies, "Mrs. Sedley, Ma'am, I hope you have room; I've
asked Dobbin of ours to come and dine here, and go with
us to Vauxhall. He's almost as modest as Jos."
"Modesty! pooh," said the stout gentleman, casting a
vainqueur look at Miss Sharp.
"He is--but you are incomparably more graceful,
Sedley," Osborne added, laughing. "I met him at the
Bedford, when I went to look for you; and I told him that
Miss Amelia was come home, and that we were all bent
on going out for a night's pleasuring; and that Mrs. Sedley
had forgiven his breaking the punch-bowl at the child's
party. Don't you remember the catastrophe, Ma'am, seven
years ago?"
"Over Mrs. Flamingo's crimson silk gown," said good-
natured Mrs. Sedley. "What a gawky it was! And his
sisters are not much more graceful. Lady Dobbin was at
Highbury last night with three of them. Such figures! my
dears."
"The Alderman's very rich, isn't he?" Osborne said
archly. "Don't you think one of the daughters would be a
good spec for me, Ma'am?"
"You foolish creature! Who would take you, I should
like to know, with your yellow face?"
"Mine a yellow face? Stop till you see Dobbin. Why, he
had the yellow fever three times; twice at Nassau, and
once at St. Kitts."
"Well, well; yours is quite yellow enough for us. Isn't
it, Emmy?" Mrs. Sedley said: at which speech Miss
Amelia only made a smile and a blush; and looking at Mr.
George Osborne's pale interesting countenance, and those
beautiful black, curling, shining whiskers, which the young
gentleman himself regarded with no ordinary
complacency, she thought in her little heart that in
His Majesty's army, or in the wide world, there never
was such a face or such a hero. "I don't care about Captain
Dobbin's complexion," she said, "or about his awkwardness.
I shall always like him, I know," her little reason being,
that he was the friend and champion of George.
"There's not a finer fellow in the service," Osborne
said, "nor a better officer, though he is not an Adonis,
certainly." And he looked towards the glass himself with
much naivete; and in so doing, caught Miss Sharp's eye
fixed keenly upon him, at which he blushed a little, and
Rebecca thought in her heart, "Ah, mon beau Monsieur!
I think I have YOUR gauge"--the little artful minx!
That evening, when Amelia came tripping into the
drawing-room in a white muslin frock, prepared for
conquest at Vauxhall, singing like a lark, and as fresh as a
rose--a very tall ungainly gentleman, with large hands
and feet, and large ears, set off by a closely cropped head
of black hair, and in the hideous military frogged coat
and cocked hat of those times, advanced to meet her, and
made her one of the clumsiest bows that was ever
performed by a mortal.
This was no other than Captain William Dobbin, of
His Majesty's Regiment of Foot, returned from
yellow fever, in the West Indies, to which the fortune
of the service had ordered his regiment, whilst so many
of his gallant comrades were reaping glory in the Peninsula.
He had arrived with a knock so very timid and quiet
that it was inaudible to the ladies upstairs: otherwise, you
may be sure Miss Amelia would never have been so bold
as to come singing into the room. As it was, the sweet
fresh little voice went right into the Captain's heart, and
nestled there. When she held out her hand for him to
shake, before he enveloped it in his own, he paused, and
thought--"Well, is it possible--are you the little maid I
remember in the pink frock, such a short time ago--the
night I upset the punch-bowl, just after I was gazetted?
Are you the little girl that George Osborne said should
marry him? What a blooming young creature you seem,
and what a prize the rogue has got!" All this he thought,
before he took Amelia's hand into his own, and as he let
his cocked hat fall.
His history since he left school, until the very moment
when we have the pleasure of meeting him again, although
not fully narrated, has yet, I think, been indicated
sufficiently for an ingenious reader by the conversation
in the last page. Dobbin, the despised grocer, was Alderman
Dobbin--Alderman Dobbin was Colonel of the City Light
Horse, then burning with military ardour to resist the
French Invasion. Colonel Dobbin's corps, in which old
Mr. Osborne himself was but an indifferent corporal, had
been reviewed by the Sovereign and the Duke of York;
and the colonel and alderman had been knighted. His
son had entered the army: and young Osborne followed
presently in the same regiment. They had served in the
West Indies and in Canada. Their regiment had just come
home, and the attachment of Dobbin to George Osborne
was as warm and generous now as it had been when the
two were schoolboys.
So these worthy people sat down to dinner presently.
They talked about war and glory, and Boney and Lord
Wellington, and the last Gazette. In those famous days
every gazette had a victory in it, and the two gallant young
men longed to see their own names in the glorious list,
and cursed their unlucky fate to belong to a regiment
which had been away from the chances of honour. Miss
Sharp kindled with this exciting talk, but Miss Sedley
trembled and grew quite faint as she heard it. Mr. Jos
told several of his tiger-hunting stories, finished the one
about Miss Cutler and Lance the surgeon; helped
Rebecca to everything on the table, and himself gobbled
and drank a great deal.
He sprang to open the door for the ladies, when they
retired, with the most killing grace--and coming back to
the table, filled himself bumper after bumper of claret,
which he swallowed with nervous rapidity.
"He's priming himself," Osborne whispered to Dobbin,
and at length the hour and the carriage arrived
for Vauxhall.
CHAPTER VI
Vauxhall
I know that the tune I am piping is a very mild
one (although there are some terrific chapters
coming presently), and must beg the good-natured
reader to remember that we are only discoursing
at present about a stockbroker's family in Russell
Square, who are taking walks, or luncheon, or dinner,
or talking and making love as people do in common life,
and without a single passionate and wonderful
incident to mark the progress of their loves. The
argument stands thus--Osborne, in love with Amelia,
has asked an old friend to dinner and to Vauxhall--Jos
Sedley is in love with Rebecca. Will he marry her?
That is the great subject now in hand.
We might have treated this subject in the genteel, or in
the romantic, or in the facetious manner. Suppose we had
laid the scene in Grosvenor Square, with the very same
adventures--would not some people have listened?
Suppose we had shown how Lord Joseph Sedley fell in love,
and the Marquis of Osborne became attached to Lady
Amelia, with the full consent of the Duke, her noble
father: or instead of the supremely genteel, suppose we
had resorted to the entirely low, and described what was
going on in Mr. Sedley's kitchen--how black Sambo was
in love with the cook (as indeed he was), and how he
fought a battle with the coachman in her behalf; how the
knife-boy was caught stealing a cold shoulder of mutton,
and Miss Sedley's new femme de chambre refused to go
to bed without a wax candle; such incidents might be
made to provoke much delightful laughter, and be
supposed to represent scenes of "life." Or if, on the contrary,
we had taken a fancy for the terrible, and made the lover
of the new femme de chambre a professional burglar, who
bursts into the house with his band, slaughters black
Sambo at the feet of his master, and carries off Amelia in
her night-dress, not to be let loose again till the third
volume, we should easily have constructed a tale of
thrilling interest, through the fiery chapters of which the
reader should hurry, panting. But my readers must hope
for no such romance, only a homely story, and must be
content with a chapter about Vauxhall, which is so short
that it scarce deserves to be called a chapter at all. And
yet it is a chapter, and a very important one too. Are not
there little chapters in everybody's life, that seem to be
nothing, and yet affect all the rest of the history?
Let us then step into the coach with the Russell Square
party, and be off to the Gardens. There is barely room
between Jos and Miss Sharp, who are on the front seat. Mr.
Osborne sitting bodkin opposite, between Captain Dobbin
and Amelia.
Every soul in the coach agreed that on that night Jos
would propose to make Rebecca Sharp Mrs. Sedley. The
parents at home had acquiesced in the arrangement,
though, between ourselves, old Mr. Sedley had a feeling
very much akin to contempt for his son. He said he was
vain, selfish, lazy, and effeminate. He could not endure his
airs as a man of fashion, and laughed heartily at his
pompous braggadocio stories. "I shall leave the fellow half
my property," he said; "and he will have, besides, plenty
of his own; but as I am perfectly sure that if you, and I,
and his sister were to die to-morrow, he would say 'Good
Gad!' and eat his dinner just as well as usual, I am not
going to make myself anxious about him. Let him marry
whom he likes. It's no affair of mine."
Amelia, on the other hand, as became a young woman
of her prudence and temperament, was quite enthusiastic
for the match. Once or twice Jos had been on the point
of saying something very important to her, to which she
was most willing to lend an ear, but the fat fellow could
not be brought to unbosom himself of his great secret,
and very much to his sister's disappointment he only rid
himself of a large sigh and turned away.
This mystery served to keep Amelia's gentle bosom in a
perpetual flutter of excitement. If she did not speak with
Rebecca on the tender subject, she compensated herself
with long and intimate conversations with Mrs. Blenkinsop,
the housekeeper, who dropped some hints to the
lady's-maid, who may have cursorily mentioned the matter
to the cook, who carried the news, I have no doubt, to all
the tradesmen, so that Mr. Jos's marriage was now talked
of by a very considerable number of persons in the
Russell Square world.
It was, of course, Mrs. Sedley's opinion that her son
would demean himself by a marriage with an artist's
daughter. "But, lor', Ma'am," ejaculated Mrs. Blenkinsop,
"we was only grocers when we married Mr. S., who
was a stock-broker's clerk, and we hadn't five hundred
pounds among us, and we're rich enough now." And
Amelia was entirely of this opinion, to which, gradually,
the good-natured Mrs. Sedley was brought.
Mr. Sedley was neutral. "Let Jos marry whom he likes,"
he said; "it's no affair of mine. This girl has no fortune;
no more had Mrs. Sedley. She seems good-humoured and
clever, and will keep him in order, perhaps. Better she,
my dear, than a black Mrs. Sedley, and a dozen of
mahogany grandchildren."
So that everything seemed to smile upon Rebecca's
fortunes. She took Jos's arm, as a matter of course, on going
to dinner; she had sate by him on the box of his open
carriage (a most tremendous "buck" he was, as he sat
there, serene, in state, driving his greys), and though
nobody said a word on the subject of the marriage,
everybody seemed to understand it. All she wanted was
the proposal, and ah! how Rebecca now felt the want of a
mother!--a dear, tender mother, who would have managed
the business in ten minutes, and, in the course of a little
delicate confidential conversation, would have extracted
the interesting avowal from the bashful lips of the young
man!
Such was the state of affairs as the carriage crossed
Westminster bridge.
The party was landed at the Royal Gardens in due time.
As the majestic Jos stepped out of the creaking vehicle
the crowd gave a cheer for the fat gentleman, who blushed
and looked very big and mighty, as he walked away with
Rebecca under his arm. George, of course, took charge of
Amelia. She looked as happy as a rose-tree in sunshine.
"I say, Dobbin," says George, "just look to the shawls
and things, there's a good fellow." And so while he paired
off with Miss Sedley, and Jos squeezed through the gate
into the gardens with Rebecca at his side, honest Dobbin
contented himself by giving an arm to the shawls, and by
paying at the door for the whole party.
He walked very modestly behind them. He was not
willing to spoil sport. About Rebecca and Jos he did not
care a fig. But he thought Amelia worthy even of the
brilliant George Osborne, and as he saw that good-looking
couple threading the walks to the girl's delight and
wonder, he watched her artless happiness with a sort of
fatherly pleasure. Perhaps he felt that he would have liked
to have something on his own arm besides a shawl (the
people laughed at seeing the gawky young officer carrying
this female burthen); but William Dobbin was very little
addicted to selfish calculation at all; and so long as his
friend was enjoying himself, how should he be discontented?
And the truth is, that of all the delights of the
Gardens; of the hundred thousand extra lamps, which
were always lighted; the fiddlers in cocked hats, who
played ravishing melodies under the gilded cockle-shell in
the midst of the gardens; the singers, both of comic and
sentimental ballads, who charmed the ears there; the
country dances, formed by bouncing cockneys and
cockneyesses, and executed amidst jumping, thumping and
laughter; the signal which announced that Madame Saqui
was about to mount skyward on a slack-rope ascending
to the stars; the hermit that always sat in the illuminated
hermitage; the dark walks, so favourable to the interviews
of young lovers; the pots of stout handed about by the
people in the shabby old liveries; and the twinkling boxes,
in which the happy feasters made-believe to eat slices of
almost invisible ham--of all these things, and of the
gentle Simpson, that kind smiling idiot, who, I daresay,
presided even then over the place--Captain William Dobbin
did not take the slightest notice.
He carried about Amelia's white cashmere shawl, and
having attended under the gilt cockle-shell, while Mrs.
Salmon performed the Battle of Borodino (a savage
cantata against the Corsican upstart, who had lately met
with his Russian reverses)--Mr. Dobbin tried to hum it
as he walked away, and found he was humming--the tune
which Amelia Sedley sang on the stairs, as she came
down to dinner.
He burst out laughing at himself; for the truth is, he
could sing no better than an owl.
It is to be understood, as a matter of course, that our
young people, being in parties of two and two, made the
most solemn promises to keep together during the evening,
and separated in ten minutes afterwards. Parties at
Vauxhall always did separate, but 'twas only to meet
again at supper-time, when they could talk of their mutual
adventures in the interval.
What were the adventures of Mr. Osborne and Miss
Amelia? That is a secret. But be sure of this--they were
perfectly happy, and correct in their behaviour; and as
they had been in the habit of being together any time these
fifteen years, their tete-a-tete offered no particular
novelty.
But when Miss Rebecca Sharp and her stout companion
lost themselves in a solitary walk, in which there were not
above five score more of couples similarly straying, they
both felt that the situation was extremely tender and
critical, and now or never was the moment Miss Sharp
thought, to provoke that declaration which was trembling
on the timid lips of Mr. Sedley. They had previously been
to the panorama of Moscow, where a rude fellow, treading
on Miss Sharp's foot, caused her to fall back with a little
shriek into the arms of Mr. Sedley, and this little incident
increased the tenderness and confidence of that gentleman
to such a degree, that he told her several of his favourite
Indian stories over again for, at least, the sixth time.
"How I should like to see India!" said Rebecca.
"SHOULD you?" said Joseph, with a most killing tenderness;
and was no doubt about to follow up this artful
interrogatory by a question still more tender (for he puffed
and panted a great deal, and Rebecca's hand, which was
placed near his heart, could count the feverish pulsations
of that organ), when, oh, provoking! the bell rang for the
fireworks, and, a great scuffling and running taking place,
these interesting lovers were obliged to follow in the
stream of people.
Captain Dobbin had some thoughts of joining the party
at supper: as, in truth, he found the Vauxhall
amusements not particularly lively--but he paraded
twice before the box where the now united couples were
met, and nobody took any notice of him. Covers were laid for
four. The mated pairs were prattling away quite happily,
and Dobbin knew he was as clean forgotten as if he had
never existed in this world.
"I should only be de trop," said the Captain, looking at
them rather wistfully. "I'd best go and talk to the hermit,"
--and so he strolled off out of the hum of men, and noise,
and clatter of the banquet, into the dark walk, at the end
of which lived that well-known pasteboard Solitary. It
wasn't very good fun for Dobbin--and, indeed, to be
alone at Vauxhall, I have found, from my own experience,
to be one of the most dismal sports ever entered into by a
bachelor.
The two couples were perfectly happy then in their
box: where the most delightful and intimate conversation
took place. Jos was in his glory, ordering about the waiters
with great majesty. He made the salad; and uncorked
the Champagne; and carved the chickens; and ate and
drank the greater part of the refreshments on the tables.
Finally, he insisted upon having a bowl of rack punch;
everybody had rack punch at Vauxhall. "Waiter, rack
punch."
That bowl of rack punch was the cause of all this
history. And why not a bowl of rack punch as well as any
other cause? Was not a bowl of prussic acid the cause of
Fair Rosamond's retiring from the world? Was not a bowl
of wine the cause of the demise of Alexander the Great,
or, at least, does not Dr. Lempriere say so?--so did this
bowl of rack punch influence the fates of all the principal
characters in this "Novel without a Hero," which we are
now relating. It influenced their life, although most of
them did not taste a drop of it.
The young ladies did not drink it; Osborne did not
like it; and the consequence was that Jos, that fat
gourmand, drank up the whole contents of the bowl;
and the consequence of his drinking up the whole contents
of the bowl was a liveliness which at first was astonishing,
and then became almost painful; for he talked and laughed so
loud as to bring scores of listeners round the box, much
to the confusion of the innocent party within it; and,
volunteering to sing a song (which he did in that maudlin
high key peculiar to gentlemen in an inebriated state), he
almost drew away the audience who were gathered round
the musicians in the gilt scollop-shell, and received from
his hearers a great deal of applause.
"Brayvo, Fat un!" said one; "Angcore, Daniel Lambert!"
said another; "What a figure for the tight-rope!"
exclaimed another wag, to the inexpressible alarm of
the ladies, and the great anger of Mr. Osborne.
"For Heaven's sake, Jos, let us get up and go," cried
that gentleman, and the young women rose.
"Stop, my dearest diddle-diddle-darling," shouted Jos,
now as bold as a lion, and clasping Miss Rebecca round
the waist. Rebecca started, but she could not get away her
hand. The laughter outside redoubled. Jos continued to
drink, to make love, and to sing; and, winking and waving
his glass gracefully to his audience, challenged all or any
to come in and take a share of his punch.
Mr. Osborne was just on the point of knocking down a
gentleman in top-boots, who proposed to take advantage
of this invitation, and a commotion seemed to be
inevitable, when by the greatest good luck a gentleman
of the name of Dobbin, who had been walking about the
gardens, stepped up to the box. "Be off, you fools!" said
this gentleman--shouldering off a great number of the crowd,
who vanished presently before his cocked hat and fierce
appearance--and he entered the box in a most agitated state.
"Good Heavens! Dobbin, where have you been?" 0sborne
said, seizing the white cashmere shawl from his
friend's arm, and huddling up Amelia in it.--"Make
yourself useful, and take charge of Jos here, whilst I
take the ladies to the carriage."
Jos was for rising to interfere--but a single push from
Osborne's finger sent him puffing back into his seat again,
and the lieutenant was enabled to remove the ladies in
safety. Jos kissed his hand to them as they retreated, and
hiccupped out "Bless you! Bless you!" Then, seizing
Captain Dobbin's hand, and weeping in the most pitiful way,
he confided to that gentleman the secret of his loves. He
adored that girl who had just gone out; he had broken
her heart, he knew he had, by his conduct; he would marry
her next morning at St. George's, Hanover Square; he'd
knock up the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth: he
would, by Jove! and have him in readiness; and, acting on
this hint, Captain Dobbin shrewdly induced him to leave
the gardens and hasten to Lambeth Palace, and, when once
out of the gates, easily conveyed Mr. Jos Sedley into a
hackney-coach, which deposited him safely at his lodgings.
George Osborne conducted the girls home in safety:
and when the door was closed upon them, and as he
walked across Russell Square, laughed so as to astonish
the watchman. Amelia looked very ruefully at her friend,
as they went up stairs, and kissed her, and went to bed
without any more talking.
"He must propose to-morrow," thought Rebecca. "He
called me his soul's darling, four times; he squeezed my
hand in Amelia's presence. He must propose to-morrow."
And so thought Amelia, too. And I dare say she thought
of the dress she was to wear as bridesmaid, and of the
presents which she should make to her nice little sister-in-
law, and of a subsequent ceremony in which she herself
might play a principal part, &c., and &c., and &c., and &c.
Oh, ignorant young creatures! How little do you know
the effect of rack punch! What is the rack in the punch,
at night, to the rack in the head of a morning? To this
truth I can vouch as a man; there is no headache in the
world like that caused by Vauxhall punch. Through the
lapse of twenty years, I can remember the consequence
of two glasses! two wine-glasses! but two, upon the
honour of a gentleman; and Joseph Sedley, who had a
liver complaint, had swallowed at least a quart of the
abominable mixture.
That next morning, which Rebecca thought was to
dawn upon her fortune, found Sedley groaning in agonies
which the pen refuses to describe. Soda-water was not
invented yet. Small beer--will it be believed!--was the
only drink with which unhappy gentlemen soothed the
fever of their previous night's potation. With this mild
beverage before him, George Osborne found the ex-
Collector of Boggley Wollah groaning on the sofa at
his lodgings. Dobbin was already in the room, good-
naturedly tending his patient of the night before. The two
officers, looking at the prostrate Bacchanalian, and
askance at each other, exchanged the most frightful
sympathetic grins. Even Sedley's valet, the most solemn
and correct of gentlemen, with the muteness and gravity of
an undertaker, could hardly keep his countenance in
order, as he looked at his unfortunate master.
"Mr. Sedley was uncommon wild last night, sir," he
whispered in confidence to Osborne, as the latter mounted
the stair. "He wanted to fight the 'ackney-coachman, sir.
The Capting was obliged to bring him upstairs in his
harms like a babby." A momentary smile flickered over
Mr. Brush's features as he spoke; instantly, however, they
relapsed into their usual unfathomable calm, as he flung
open the drawing-room door, and announced "Mr.
Hosbin."
"How are you, Sedley?" that young wag began, after
surveying his victim. "No bones broke? There's a
hackney-coachman downstairs with a black eye, and a
tied-up head, vowing he'll have the law of you."
"What do you mean--law?" Sedley faintly asked.
"For thrashing him last night--didn't he, Dobbin? You
hit out, sir, like Molyneux. The watchman says he never
saw a fellow go down so straight. Ask Dobbin."
"You DID have a round with the coachman," Captain
Dobbin said, "and showed plenty of fight too."
"And that fellow with the white coat at Vauxhall! How
Jos drove at him! How the women screamed! By Jove,
sir, it did my heart good to see you. I thought you civilians
had no pluck; but I'll never get in your way when you
are in your cups, Jos."
"I believe I'm very terrible, when I'm roused,"
ejaculated Jos from the sofa, and made a grimace so
dreary and ludicrous, that the Captain's politeness could
restrain him no longer, and he and Osborne fired off a
ringing volley of laughter.
Osborne pursued his advantage pitilessly. He thought
Jos a milksop. He had been revolving in his mind the
marriage question pending between Jos and Rebecca, and
was not over well pleased that a member of a family into
which he, George Osborne, of the --th, was going
to marry, should make a mesalliance with a little nobody
--a little upstart governess. "You hit, you poor old
fellow!" said Osborne. "You terrible! Why, man, you
couldn't stand--you made everybody laugh in the
Gardens, though you were crying yourself. You were
maudlin, Jos. Don't you remember singing a song?"
"A what?" Jos asked.
"A sentimental song, and calling Rosa, Rebecca, what's
her name, Amelia's little friend--your dearest diddle-
diddle-darling?" And this ruthless young fellow, seizing
hold of Dobbin's hand, acted over the scene, to the horror
of the original performer, and in spite of Dobbin's good-
natured entreaties to him to have mercy.
"Why should I spare him?" Osborne said to his friend's
remonstrances, when they quitted the invalid, leaving him
under the hands of Doctor Gollop. "What the deuce right
has he to give himself his patronizing airs, and make fools
of us at Vauxhall? Who's this little schoolgirl that is
ogling and making love to him? Hang it, the family's
low enough already, without HER. A governess is all very
well, but I'd rather have a lady for my sister-in-law. I'm
a liberal man; but I've proper pride, and know my own
station: let her know hers. And I'll take down that great
hectoring Nabob, and prevent him from being made a
greater fool than he is. That's why I told him to look out,
lest she brought an action against him."
"I suppose you know best," Dobbin said, though rather
dubiously. "You always were a Tory, and your family's
one of the oldest in England. But --"
"Come and see the girls, and make love to Miss Sharp
yourself," the lieutenant here interrupted his friend; but
Captain Dobbin declined to join Osborne in his daily visit
to the young ladies in Russell Square.
As George walked down Southampton Row, from
Holborn, he laughed as he saw, at the Sedley Mansion,
in two different stories two heads on the look-out.
The fact is, Miss Amelia, in the drawing-room balcony,
was looking very eagerly towards the opposite side of the
Square, where Mr. Osborne dwelt, on the watch for the
lieutenant himself; and Miss Sharp, from her little bed-
room on the second floor, was in observation until Mr.
Joseph's great form should heave in sight.
"Sister Anne is on the watch-tower," said he to Amelia,
"but there's nobody coming"; and laughing and enjoying
the joke hugely, he described in the most ludicrous terms
to Miss Sedley, the dismal condition of her brother.
"I think it's very cruel of you to laugh, George," she
said, looking particularly unhappy; but George only
laughed the more at her piteous and discomfited mien,
persisted in thinking the joke a most diverting one, and
when Miss Sharp came downstairs, bantered her with a
great deal of liveliness upon the effect of her charms on
the fat civilian.
"O Miss Sharp! if you could but see him this morning,"
he said--"moaning in his flowered dressing-gown--
writhing on his sofa; if you could but have seen him
lolling out his tongue to Gollop the apothecary."
"See whom?" said Miss Sharp.
"Whom? O whom? Captain Dobbin, of course, to whom
we were all so attentive, by the way, last night."
"We were very unkind to him," Emmy said, blushing
very much. "I--I quite forgot him."
"Of course you did," cried Osborne, still on the laugh.
"One can't be ALWAYS thinking about Dobbin, you know,
Amelia. Can one, Miss Sharp?"
"Except when he overset the glass of wine at dinner,"
Miss Sharp said, with a haughty air and a toss of the
head, "I never gave the existence of Captain Dobbin one
single moment's consideration."
"Very good, Miss Sharp, I'll tell him," Osborne said;
and as he spoke Miss Sharp began to have a feeling of
distrust and hatred towards this young officer, which he
was quite unconscious of having inspired. "He is to make
fun of me, is he?" thought Rebecca. "Has he been
laughing about me to Joseph? Has he frightened him?
Perhaps he won't come."--A film passed over her eyes,
and her heart beat quite quick.
"You're always joking," said she, smiling as innocently
as she could. "Joke away, Mr. George; there's nobody
to defend ME." And George Osborne, as she walked away
--and Amelia looked reprovingly at him--felt some little
manly compunction for having inflicted any unnecessary
unkindness upon this helpless creature. "My dearest
Amelia," said he, "you are too good--too kind. You
don't know the world. I do. And your little friend Miss
Sharp must learn her station."
"Don't you think Jos will--"
"Upon my word, my dear, I don't know. He may, or
may not. I'm not his master. I only know he is a very
foolish vain fellow, and put my dear little girl into a very
painful and awkward position last night. My dearest
diddle-diddle-darling!" He was off laughing again, and he
did it so drolly that Emmy laughed too.
All that day Jos never came. But Amelia had no fear
about this; for the little schemer had actually sent away
the page, Mr. Sambo's aide-de-camp, to Mr. Joseph's
lodgings, to ask for some book he had promised, and how
he was; and the reply through Jos's man, Mr. Brush, was,