Anna St. Ives Part 8

And what diddee ever do for me? Diddee ever addle half an ounce in your life without being well ribb rost.i.t? Tongue pad me indeed! Ferrit and flickur at me! Rite your hippistles and gospels! I a b.u.t.t.u.r.d my parsnips finely! Am I a to be hufft and snufft o' this here manner, by a sir jimmee jingle brains of my own feedin and breedin? Am I to be ramshaklt out of the super nakullums in spite o' my teeth? Yea and go softly! I crack the nut and you eat the kernel!

I tellee once again you've an addle pate o' your own! Go to France to learn to dance, to be sure! Better stay at home and learn to transmogrify a few kink's picters into your pocket. No marry come fairly! Squire Nincomp.o.o.p! He would not a sifflicate Sir Arthur, and advise him to stay at home, and so keep the rhino for the roast meat!

He would not a take his cue, a dunder pate! A doesn't a know so much as his a, b, c! A hasn't so much as a single glimm of the omnum gathrum in his noddl! And pretends to hektur and doktur me! Shave a cow's tail and a goat's chin, an you want hair.

And then again what did I say to ee about missee? What did I say?

Didn't I as good as tellee witch way she cast a sheepz i? That indeed would a be summut! An you will jig your heels amunk the jerry c.u.m p.o.o.pz, you might a then dance to some tune. I a warruntee I a got all a my i teeth imme head. What doesn't I know witch way the wind sets when I sees the chimblee smoke? To be sure I duz; as well with a wench as a weather-c.o.c.k! Didn't I tellee y'ad a more then one foot i'the stirrup?

She didn't a like to leave her jack in a bandbox behind her; and so missee forsooth forgot her tom-t.i.t, and master my jerry whissle an please you galloped after with it. And then with a whoop he must amble to Lunnun; and then with a halloo he must caper to France! She'll deposit the rhino; yet Nicodemus has a no notion of a what she'd be at!

If you've a no wit o' your own, learn a little of folks that have some to spare. You'll never a be worth a bawbee o' your own savin. I tellee that. And ast for what's mine why it's my own. So take me ritely, now is your time to look about ee. Then indeed! If so, why so be it; yea ay and amen, a G.o.d's name, say I. The fool a held his mouth open, and a down a droppt the plumb.

Not after all that it would a be any sitch a mighty mirakkillus catch nether, as I shall manage matters mayhap. But that's a nether here nor there. And so you know my mind. Take it or leave it or let it alone.

It's all a won to I. Thos and I gives all this here good advice for nothink at all, what do I get by it? Give me but the wide world and one and 20, with 5 farthins ten fingurs and a tongue, and a turn me adrift to morrow; I'de a work my way: I'de a fear nether wind nor weather. For why? I'de a give any man a peck of sweet words for a pint of honey.

What! Shall I let the lock rustee for a want of a little oilin? Haven't I a told ee often and often, that a glib tongue, smooth and softly, always with the grain, is worth a kink's kinkddum?

So mind a what ee be at. Play your cards out kuninlee; and then, why if so be as thinks should turn up trumps, why we shall see. That is, take me ritely; and I has a no notion that ee should take it into your n.o.bb noddl that I means to suppose that I shall come down with the dust. No forsooth! For what and for why and for wherefore? We shall see--Why ay to be sure!--But what shall we see? Why we shall see how generous and how kappaishus my younker will be, to his poor old father: we shall see that.

Not but if the ready be wantin, plump do you see me, down on the nail head, and if Sir Arthur should a say as it must be so, why so. Mayhap we--But I tell ee again and again that's a nether here nor there.

Besides leave me to hummdudgin Sir Arthur. Mind you your hitts with missee, I'll a foistee fubb he.

And so now show your affection for all this my lovin kindness and mercy; and crown my latter days with peace and joy, witch nothink can xseed but the joys of heaven in his glory everlastin, witch is a preparin for me and for all kristshun soles, glory and onnur and power and praise and thanks givin, world without end, for ever and ever, G.o.d be good unto us, and grant us his salvation; amen, and it be his holy will.

ABIMELECH HENLEY

LETTER XVII

_The Honourable Mrs. Clifton to her son, c.o.ke Clifton_

_Rose-Bank_

I Direct this letter to you, my dear son, at Paris; where it will either find you, or lie at the banker's till your arrival. A packet accompanies it, which contains the accounts of your late uncle with Monsieur de Chateauneuf; by which it appears there is a considerable balance in his favour, which as you know by will devolves to me.

I hope, when you have settled this business, you will be disposed to return to England; and that I shall once again have the happiness to see you before I die. Do not imagine I speak of death to attract any false pity. But my state of health obliges me to consider this serious event as at no great distance; though I do not think myself in immediate danger.

Sir Arthur St. Ives and his lovely daughter will soon be in Paris. They requested letters from me; and, among others, I thought I could not recommend them to any one with more propriety than to my son. There is an intimacy between our families at present; which was first occasioned by an affection which your sister Louisa and Anna St. Ives conceived for each other, and which has continually increased, very much indeed to my satisfaction. For, before I saw this young lady, I never met with one whom I thought deserving of the friendship of your sister, Louisa; whose strength of mind, if I do not mistake, is very extraordinary for her years. Yet even I, her mother, and liable enough to be partial, have sometimes thought she must cede the palm to her friend, the charming Anna.

My reason for writing thus is that you may be guilty of no mistakes of character, which indeed I think is very unlikely, and that you will shew Sir Arthur all possible respect, as well as his daughter, in justice to yourself, and as the friends of the family. Your sister writes under the same cover; and I cannot doubt, whenever you read her letters, but that you must receive very great satisfaction, to find you have such a sister.

I scarcely need tell you, Clifton, that though you have resided but little with me, I feel all the fond affection of a parent; that I am earnestly desirous to hear of your happiness, and to promote it; and that no pleasure which the world could afford to me, personally, would equal that of seeing you become a good and great man. You have studied; you have travelled; you have read both men and books; every advantage which the most anxious desire to form your mind could procure has been yours. I own that a mother's fondness forms great expectations of you; which, when you read this, be your faculties strong or weak, you will very probably say you are capable of more than fulfilling. The feeble, hearing their worth or talents questioned, are too apt to swell and a.s.sume; and I have heard it said that the strong are too intimately acquainted with themselves to harbour doubt. I believe it ought to be so. I believe it to be better that we should act boldly, and bring full conviction upon ourselves when mistaken, than that a timid spirit should render us too cautious to do either good or harm. I would not preach; neither indeed at present could I. A thousand ideas seemed crowding upon my mind; but they have expelled each other as quickly as they came, and I scarcely know what to add. My head-achs disqualify me for long or consistent thinking; and nothing I believe but habit keeps me from being half an idiot.

One thing however I cannot forget; which is, that I am your mother, Clifton; and that I have the most ardent and unremitting desire to see you a virtuous and a happy man. In which hope my blessing and love are most sincerely yours.

M. CLIFTON

LETTER XVIII

_Louisa Clifton to Her Brother, c.o.ke Clifton_

_Rose-Bank_

It is long, my dear brother, since I received a letter from you; and still longer since I had the pleasure to see you. How many rivers, seas, valleys, and mountains have you traversed, since that time! What various nations, what numerous opposite and characteristic countenances have you beheld! From all and each of them I hope you have learned something. I hope the succession of objects has not been so quick as to leave vacuity in the mind.

My propensity to moralize used formerly [And our formerlies you know, brother, are not of any long duration.] to tease and half put you out of temper. Indulge me once more in hoping it will not do so at present; for I believe I am more p.r.o.ne to this habit than ever. What can I say to my brother? Shall I tattle to him the scandal of the village, were I mistress of it? Shall I describe to him the fashion of a new cap; or the charms of a dress that has lately travelled from Persia to Paris, from Paris to London, and from London to Rose-Bank? Or shall I recount the hopes and fears of a sister; who has sometimes the temerity to think; who would be so unfashionable as to love her brother, not for the cut of his coat, not for the French or Italian phrases with which he might interlard his discourse, not for any recital of the delight which foreign ladies took in him and which he took in foreign ladies, not for a loud tongue and a prodigious lack of wit, not for any of the antics or impertinences which I have too frequently remarked in young men of fashion, but for something directly the reverse of all these: for well-digested principles, an ardent desire of truth, incessant struggles to shake off prejudices; for emanations of soul, bursts of thought, and flashes of genius. For such a brother, oh how eager would be my arms, how open my heart!

Do not think, my dear Clifton, I am unjust enough to mean any thing personal; to satirize what I can scarcely be said to have seen, or to condemn unheard. No. Your faculties were always lively. You have seen much, must have learned much, and why may I not suppose you are become all that a sister's heart can desire? Pardon me if I expect too much.

Do we not all admire and seek after excellence? When we are told such a person is a man of genius, do we not wish to enquire into the fact?

And, if true, are we not desirous of making him our intimate? And do not the ties of blood doubly enforce such wishes, in a brother's behalf? From what you were, I have no doubt but that you are become an accomplished man. But I hope you are also become something much better.

I hope that, by the exertion of your talents, acquirements, and genius, I shall see you the friend of man, and the true citizen of the world.

If you are all that I hope, I think you will not be offended with these sisterly effusions. If you are not, or but in part, you may imagine me vain and impertinent. But still I should suppose you will forgive me, because you are so seldom troubled with such grave epistles; and one now and then, if not intolerably long, may be endured from an elder sister.

Yet why do I say elder? Neither age nor station have any just claim; for there can be none, except the claims of truth and reason; against which there is no appeal. I am eighteen months older than my brother, and up rises the claim of eldership! Such are the habits, the prejudices we have to counteract.

My dear mamma has mentioned Sir Arthur St. Ives, in her letter, and his lovely daughter, Anna; more lovely in mind even than in form, and of the latter a single glance will enable you to judge. I need not request you to be attentive and civil to her, for it is impossible you should be otherwise. Your own gratification will induce you to shew her the public places, and render her every service in your power; which will be more than overpaid by a.s.sociating with her; for it is indeed a delight to be in her company. For grace and beauty of person, she has no equal; and still less can she be equalled, by any person of her age, for the endowments of wit and understanding. I am half angry with myself for pretending to recommend her; when, as you will see, she can so much more effectually recommend herself.

I have nothing to add except to say that, when my dear brother has a moment's leisure, I shall be glad to hear from him; and that I remain his very affectionate sister,

L. CLIFTON

P.S. On recollection, I am convinced it is a false fear which has prevented me from mentioning another person, very eminently deserving of esteem and respect; a fear of doing harm where I meant to do good.

We ought to do our duty, and risk the consequences. The absurd pride of ancestry occasions many of our young gentlemen to treat those whom they deem their inferiors by birth with haughtiness, and often with something worse; forgetting that by this means they immediately cut themselves off as it were from society: for, by contemning those who are a supposed step below them, they encourage and incur contempt from the next immediately above them. This is in some measure the practice: and, were it true that birth is any merit, it would be a practice to which we ought to pay a still more strict attention. The young gentleman however whom I mean to recommend, for his great and peculiar worth, is Mr. Frank Henley, the son of a person who is gardener and steward to Sir Arthur; or rather what the people among whom you are at present would call his _homme d'affaires_. But I must leave my friends to speak for themselves; which they will do more efficaciously than can be done by any words of mine.

END OF VOLUME I

VOLUME II

LETTER XIX

_c.o.ke Clifton to Guy Fairfax, at Venice_

_Paris, Hotel de l'Universite, pres le Pont Royal_

I write, Fairfax, according to promise, to inform you that I have been a fortnight in France, and four days in this city. The tract of country over which I have pa.s.sed, within these three months, is considerable.

From Naples to Rome; from Rome to Florence; from Florence to Venice, where we spent our carnival; from Venice to Modena, Parma, and Genoa; from thence to Turin; from Turin to Geneva; then, turning to the left, to Lyons; and from Lyons to Paris. Objects have pa.s.sed before me in such a rapid succession, that the time I have spent abroad, though not more than a year and a half, appears something like a life. The sight of the proud Alps, which boldly look eternity in the face, imparts a sensation of length of time wholly inadequate to the few hours that are employed in pa.s.sing them. The labour up is a kind of age; and the swift descent is like falling from the clouds, once more to become an inhabitant of earth.

Here at Paris I half fancy myself at home. And yet, to timid people who have never beheld the ocean, and who are informed that seas divide France and England, Paris appears to be at an unattainable distance.

Every thing is relative in this world; great or small near or distant only by comparison. The traveller who should have pa.s.sed the deserts, and suffered all the perils all the emotions of a journey from Bengal by land, would think himself much nearer home, at Naples, than I do, coming from Naples, at Paris: and those who have sailed round the world seem satisfied that their labour is within a hair's breadth of being at an end, when they arrive, on their return, at the Cape of Good Hope.

You, Fairfax, have frequently asked me to give you accounts of this and that place, of the things I have seen, and of the observations I have made. But I have more frequently put the same kind of questions to myself, and never yet could return a satisfactory answer. I have seen people whose manners are so different from those of my own country, that I have seemed to act with them from a kind of conviction of their being of another species. Yet a moment's consideration undeceives me: I find them to be mere men. Men of different habits, indeed, but actuated by the same pa.s.sions, the same desire of self-gratification. Yes, Fairfax, the sun moon and stars make their appearance, in Italy, as regularly as in England; nay much more so, for there is not a tenth part of the intervening clouds.