Burlesques Part 55

What was I to do? Oh! my heart beats with paternal grat.i.tude when I think of what my Tug did!

As soon as this young cab-chap put himself into a fighting att.i.tude, Master Tuggeridge c.o.xe--who had been standing by laughing very rudely, I thought--Master Tuggeridge c.o.xe, I say, flung his jacket suddenly into his mamma's face (the bra.s.s b.u.t.tons made her start and recovered her a little), and, before we could say a word was in the ring in which we stood (formed by the porters, nine orangemen and women, I don't know how many newspaper-boys, hotel-cads, and old-clothesmen), and, whirling about two little white fists in the face of the gentleman in the red waistcoat, who brought up a great pair of black ones to bear on the enemy, was engaged in an instant.

But la bless you! Tug hadn't been at Richmond School for nothing; and MILLED away one, two, right and left--like a little hero as he is, with all his dear mother's spirit in him. First came a crack which sent a long dusky white hat--that looked damp and deep like a well, and had a long black c.r.a.pe-rag twisted round it--first came a crack which sent this white hat spinning over the gentleman's cab and scattered among the crowd a vast number of things which the cabman kept in it,--such as a ball of string, a piece of candle, a comb, a whip-lash, a little warbler, a slice of bacon, &c. &c.

The cabman seemed sadly ashamed of this display, but Tug gave him no time: another blow was planted on his cheekbone; and a third, which hit him straight on the nose, sent this rude cabman straight down to the ground.

"Brayvo, my lord!" shouted all the people around.

"I won't have no more, thank yer," said the little cabman, gathering himself up. "Give us over my fare, vil yer, and let me git away?"

"What's your fare, NOW, you cowardly little thief?" says Tug.

"Vy, then, two-and-eightpence," says he. "Go along,--you KNOW it is!"

and two-and-eightpence he had; and everybody applauded Tug, and hissed the cab-boy, and asked Tug for something to drink. We heard the packet-bell ringing, and all run down the stairs to be in time.

I now thought our troubles would soon be over; mine were, very nearly so, in one sense at least: for after Mrs. c.o.xe and Jemimarann, and Tug, and the maid, and valet, and valuables had been handed across, it came to my turn. I had often heard of people being taken up by a PLANK, but seldom of their being set down by one. Just as I was going over, the vessel rode off a little, the board slipped, and down I soused into the water. You might have heard Mrs. c.o.xe's shriek as far as Gravesend; it rung in my ears as I went down, all grieved at the thought of leaving her a disconsolate widder. Well, up I came again, and caught the brim of my beaver-hat--though I have heard that drowning men catch at straws:--I floated, and hoped to escape by hook or by crook; and, luckily, just then, I felt myself suddenly jerked by the waistband of my whites, and found myself hauled up in the air at the end of a boat-hook, to the sound of "Yeho! yeho! yehoi! yehoi!" and so I was dragged aboard. I was put to bed, and had swallowed so much water that it took a very considerable quant.i.ty of brandy to bring it to a proper mixture in my inside. In fact, for some hours I was in a very deplorable state.

NOTICE TO QUIT.

Well, we arrived at Boulogne; and Jemmy, after making inquiries, right and left, about the Baron, found that no such person was known there; and being bent, I suppose, at all events, on marrying her daughter to a lord, she determined to set off for Paris, where, as he had often said, he possessed a magnificent ---- hotel he called it;--and I remember Jemmy being mightily indignant at the idea; but hotel, we found afterwards, means only a house in French, and this reconciled her. Need I describe the road from Boulogne to Paris? or need I describe that Capitol itself? Suffice it to say, that we made our appearance there, at "Murisse's Hotel," as became the family of c.o.xe Tuggeridge; and saw everything worth seeing in the metropolis in a week. It nearly killed me, to be sure; but, when you're on a pleasure-party in a foreign country, you must not mind a little inconvenience of this sort.

Well, there is, near the city of Paris, a splendid road and row of trees, which--I don't know why--is called the Shandeleezy, or Elysian Fields, in French: others, I have heard, call it the Shandeleery; but mine I know to be the correct p.r.o.nunciation. In the middle of this Shandeleezy is an open s.p.a.ce of ground, and a tent where, during the summer, Mr. Franconi, the French Ashley, performs with his horses and things. As everybody went there, and we were told it was quite the thing, Jemmy agreed that we should go too; and go we did.

It's just like Ashley's: there's a man just like Mr. Piddicombe, who goes round the ring in a huzzah-dress, cracking a whip; there are a dozen Miss Woolfords, who appear like Polish princesses, Dihannas, Sultannas, Cachuchas, and heaven knows what! There's the fat man, who comes in with the twenty-three dresses on, and turns out to be the living skeleton! There's the clowns, the sawdust, the white horse that dances a hornpipe, the candles stuck in hoops, just as in our own dear country.

My dear wife, in her very finest clothes, with all the world looking at her, was really enjoying this spectacle (which doesn't require any knowledge of the language, seeing that the dumb animals don't talk it), when there came in, presently, "the great Polish act of the Sarmatian horse-tamer, on eight steeds," which we were all of us longing to see.

The horse-tamer, to music twenty miles an hour, rushed in on four of his horses, leading the other four, and skurried round the ring. You couldn't see him for the sawdust, but everybody was delighted, and applauded like mad. Presently, you saw there were only three horses in front: he had slipped one more between his legs, another followed, and it was clear that the consequences would be fatal, if he admitted any more. The people applauded more than ever; and when, at last, seven and eight were made to go in, not wholly, but sliding dexterously in and out, with the others, so that you did not know which was which, the house, I thought, would come down with applause; and the Sarmatian horse-tamer bowed his great feathers to the ground. At last the music grew slower, and he cantered leisurely round the ring; bending, smirking, seesawing, waving his whip, and laying his hand on his heart, just as we have seen the Ashley's people do. But fancy our astonishment when, suddenly, this Sarmatian horse-tamer, coming round with his four pair at a canter, and being opposite our box, gave a start, and a--hupp!

which made all his horses stop stock-still at an instant.

"Albert!" screamed my dear Jemmy: "Albert! Bahbahbah--baron!" The Sarmatian looked at her for a minute; and turning head over heels, three times, bolted suddenly off his horses, and away out of our sight.

It was HIS EXCELLENCY THE BARON DE PUNTER!

Jemmy went off in a fit as usual, and we never saw the Baron again; but we heard, afterwards, that Punter was an apprentice of Franconi's, and had run away to England, thinking to better himself, and had joined Mr.

Richardson's army; but Mr. Richardson, and then London, did not agree with him; and we saw the last of him as he sprung over the barriers at the Tuggeridgeville tournament.

"Well, Jemimarann," says Jemmy, in a fury, "you shall marry Tagrag; and if I can't have a baroness for a daughter, at least you shall be a baronet's lady." Poor Jemimarann only sighed: she knew it was of no use to remonstrate.

Paris grew dull to us after this, and we were more eager than ever to go back to London: for what should we hear, but that that monster, Tuggeridge, of the City--old Tug's black son, forsooth!--was going to contest Jemmy's claim to the property, and had filed I don't know how many bills against us in Chancery! Hearing this, we set off immediately, and we arrived at Boulogne, and set off in that very same "Grand Turk"

which had brought us to France.

If you look in the bills, you will see that the steamers leave London on Sat.u.r.day morning, and Boulogne on Sat.u.r.day night; so that there is often not an hour between the time of arrival and departure. Bless us! bless us! I pity the poor Captain that, for twenty-four hours at a time, is on a paddle-box, roaring out, "Ease her! Stop her!" and the poor servants, who are laying out breakfast, lunch, dinner, tea, supper;--breakfast, lunch, dinner, tea, supper again;--for layers upon layers of travellers, as it were; and most of all, I pity that unhappy steward, with those unfortunate tin-basins that he must always keep an eye over. Little did we know what a storm was brooding in our absence; and little were we prepared for the awful, awful fate that hung over our Tuggeridgeville property.

Biggs, of the great house of Higgs, Biggs, and Blatherwick, was our man of business: when I arrived in London I heard that he had just set off to Paris after me. So we started down to Tuggeridgeville instead of going to Portland Place. As we came through the lodge-gates, we found a crowd a.s.sembled within them; and there was that horrid Tuggeridige on horseback, with a shabby-looking man, called Mr. Scapgoat, and his man of business, and many more. "Mr. Scapgoat," says Tuggeridge, grinning, and handing him over a sealed paper, "here's the lease; I leave you in possession, and wish you good morning."

"In possession of what?" says the rightful lady of Tuggeridgeville, leaning out of the carriage-window. She hated black Tuggeridge, as she called him, like poison: the very first week of our coming to Portland Place, when he called to ask rest.i.tution of some plate which he said was his private property, she called him a base-born blackamoor, and told him to quit the house. Since then there had been law squabbles between us without end, and all sorts of writings, meetings, and arbitrations.

"Possession of my estate of Tuggeridgeville, madam," roars he, "left me by my father's will, which you have had notice of these three weeks, and know as well as I do."

"Old Tug left no will," shrieked Jemmy; "he didn't die to leave his estates to blackamoors--to negroes--to base-born mulatto story-tellers; if he did may I be -----"

"Oh, hush! dearest mamma," says Jemimarann. "Go it again, mother!" says Tug, who is always sn.i.g.g.e.ring.

"What is this business, Mr. Tuggeridge?" cried Tagrag (who was the only one of our party that had his senses). "What is this will?"

"Oh, it's merely a matter of form," said the lawyer, riding up. "For heaven's sake, madam, be peaceable; let my friends, Higgs, Biggs, and Blatherwick, arrange with me. I am surprised that none of their people are here. All that you have to do is to eject us; and the rest will follow, of course."

"Who has taken possession of this here property?" roars Jemmy, again.

"My friend Mr. Scapgoat," said the lawyer.--Mr. Scapgoat grinned.

"Mr. Scapgoat," said my wife, shaking her fist at him (for she is a woman of no small spirit), "if you don't leave this ground I'll have you pushed out with pitchforks, I will--you and your beggarly blackamoor yonder." And, suiting the action to the word, she clapped a stable fork into the hands of one of the gardeners, and called another, armed with a rake, to his help, while young Tug set the dog at their heels, and I hurrahed for joy to see such villany so properly treated.

"That's sufficient, ain't it?" said Mr. Scapgoat, with the calmest air in the world. "Oh, completely," said the lawyer. "Mr. Tuggeridge, we've ten miles to dinner. Madam, your very humble servant." And the whole posse of them rode away.

LAW LIFE a.s.sURANCE.

We knew not what this meant, until we received a strange doc.u.ment from Higgs, in London--which begun, "Middles.e.x to wit. Samuel c.o.x, late of Portland Place, in the city of Westminster, in the said county, was attached to answer Samuel Scapgoat, of a plea, wherefore, with force and arms, he entered into one messuage, with the appurtenances, which John Tuggeridge, Esq., demised to the said Samuel Scapgoat, for a term which is not yet expired, and ejected him." And it went on to say that "we, with force of arms, viz, with swords, knives, and staves, had ejected him." Was there ever such a monstrous falsehood? when we did but stand in defence of our own; and isn't it a sin that we should have been turned out of our rightful possessions upon such a rascally plea?

Higgs, Biggs, and Blatherwick had evidently been bribed; for would you believe it?--they told us to give up possession at once, as a will was found, and we could not defend the action. My Jemmy refused their proposal with scorn, and laughed at the notion of the will: she p.r.o.nounced it to be a forgery, a vile blackamoor forgery; and believes, to this day, that the story of its having been made thirty years ago, in Calcutta, and left there with old Tug's papers, and found there, and brought to England, after a search made by order of Tuggeridge junior, is a scandalous falsehood.

Well, the cause was tried. Why need I say anything concerning it? What shall I say of the Lord Chief Justice, but that he ought to be ashamed of the wig he sits in? What of Mr. ---- and Mr. ----, who exerted their eloquence against justice and the poor? On our side, too, was no less a man than Mr. Serjeant Binks, who, ashamed I am, for the honor of the British bar, to say it, seemed to have been bribed too: for he actually threw up his case! Had he behaved like Mr. Mulligan, his junior--and to whom, in this humble way, I offer my thanks--all might have been well. I never knew such an effect produced, as when Mr. Mulligan, appearing for the first time in that court, said, "Standing here upon the pidestal of secred Thamis; seeing around me the arnymints of a profission I rispict; having before me a vinnerable judge, and an enlightened jury--the counthry's glory, the netion's cheap defender, the poor man's priceless palladium: how must I thrimble, my lard, how must the blush bejew my cheek--" (somebody cried out, "O CHEEKS!" In the court there was a dreadful roar of laughing; and when order was established, Mr.

Mulligan continued:)--"My lard, I heed them not; I come from a counthry accustomed to opprission, and as that counthry--yes, my lard, THAT IRELAND--(do not laugh, I am proud of it)--is ever, in spite of her tyrants, green, and lovely, and beautiful: my client's cause, likewise, will rise shuperior to the malignant imbecility--I repeat, the MALIGNANT IMBECILITY--of those who would thrample it down; and in whose teeth, in my client's name, in my counthry's--ay, and MY OWN--I, with folded arrums, hurl a scarnful and eternal defiance!"

"For heaven's sake, Mr. Milligan"--("MULLIGAN, ME LARD," cried my defender)--"Well, Mulligan, then, be calm, and keep to your brief."

Mr. Mulligan did; and for three hours and a quarter, in a speech crammed with Latin quotations, and unsurpa.s.sed for eloquence, he explained the situation of me and my family; the romantic manner in which Tuggeridge the elder gained his fortune, and by which it afterwards came to my wife; the state of Ireland; the original and virtuous poverty of the c.o.xes--from which he glanced pa.s.sionately, for a few minutes (until the judge stopped him), to the poverty of his own country; my excellence as a husband, father, landlord; my wife's, as a wife, mother, landlady. All was in vain--the trial went against us. I was soon taken in execution for the damages; five hundred pounds of law expenses of my own, and as much more of Tuggeridge's. He would not pay a farthing, he said, to get me out of a much worse place than the Fleet. I need not tell you that along with the land went the house in town, and the money in the funds.

Tuggeridge, he who had thousands before, had it all. And when I was in prison, who do you think would come and see me? None of the Barons, nor Counts, nor Foreign Amba.s.sadors, nor Excellencies, who used to fill our house, and eat and drink at our expense,--not even the ungrateful Tagrag!

I could not help now saying to my dear wife, "See, my love, we have been gentlefolks for exactly a year, and a pretty life we have had of it.

In the first place, my darling, we gave grand dinners, and everybody laughed at us."

"Yes, and recollect how ill they made you," cries my daughter.

"We asked great company, and they insulted us."

"And spoilt mamma's temper," said Jemimarann.

"Hush! Miss," said her mother; "we don't want YOUR advice."

"Then you must make a country gentleman of me."

"And send Pa into dunghills," roared Tug.