Homeward Bound; Or, the Chase Part 25

"Did you inquire if she were engaged?--Mr. Monday, we will drink her health."

"'Saint Michael and the Dragon is a _shefdowory_.'--"

"Un quoi?"

"Un chef-d'oeuvre, mademoiselle."

"--' The manner in which the angel holds the dragon with his feet, looking exactly like a worm trodden on by the foot of a child, is exquisitely plaintive and interesting. Indeed these touches of nature abound in the works of the old masters, and I saw several fruit-pieces that I could have eaten. One really gets an appet.i.te by looking at many things here, and I no longer wonder that a Raphael, a t.i.tian, a Correggio, a Guide-o.'--"

"Un qui?"

"Un Guido, mademoiselle."

"Or a Cooley."

"And pray who may he be?" asked Mr. Monday.

"A young genius in Dodgetown, who promises one day to render the name of an American ill.u.s.trious. He has painted a new sign for the store, that in its way is quite equal to the marriage of Cana. 'I have stood with tears over the despair of a Niobe,'" continuing to read, "'and witnessed the contortions of the snakes in the Laoc.o.o.n with a convulsive eagerness to clutch them, that has made me fancy I could hear them hiss." That sentence, I think, will be likely to be noticed even in the New-Old-New-Yorker, one of the very best reviews of our days, gentlemen."

"Take a little more punch, Mr. Dodge," put in the attentive captain; "this grows affecting, and needs alleviation, as Saunders would say. Mr. Monday, you will get a bad name for being too sober, if you never empty your gla.s.s. Proceed, in the name of Heaven! Mr. Dodge."

"'In the evening I went to the Grand Opery.'--"

"Ou, done?"

"Au grand Hoppery, mademoiselle," replied John Effingham.

"--'To the _Grand Opery_,'" resumed Mr. Dodge, with emphasis, his eyes beginning to glisten by this time, for he had often applied to the punch for inspiration, "'where I listened to music that is altogether inferior to that which we enjoy in America, especially at the general trainings, and on the Sabbath. The want of science was conspicuous; and if _this_ be music, then do I know nothing about it!'"

"A judicious remark!"'exclaimed the captain.--"Mr. Dodge has great merit as a writer, for he loses no occasion to ill.u.s.trate his opinions by the most unanswerable facts. He has acquired a taste for Zip c.o.o.n and Long Tail Blue, and it is no wonder he feels a contempt for your inferior artists."

"'As for the dancing,'" continued the editor of the Active Inquirer, "'it is my decided impression that nothing can be worse. The movement was more suited to a funeral than the ball-room, and I affirm, without fear of contradiction, that there is not an a.s.sembly in all America in which a _cotillion_ would not be danced in one-half the time that one was danced in the _bally_ to-night.'"

"Dans le quoi?"

"I believe I have not given the real Parisian p.r.o.nunciation to this word, which the French call bal-_lay_", continued the reader, with great candour.

"Belay, or make all fast, as we say on ship-board. Mr. Dodge, as master, of this vessel, I beg to return you the united, or as Saunders would say, the condensed thanks of the pa.s.sengers, for this information; and next Sat.u.r.day we look for a renewal of the pleasure. The ladies are getting to be sleepy, I perceive, and as Mr. Monday _never_ drinks and the other gentlemen have finished their punch, we may as well retire, to get ready for a hard day's work to-morrow."

Captain Truck made this proposal, because he saw that one or two of the party were _plenum punch_, and that Eve and her companion were becoming aware of the propriety of retiring. It was also true that he foresaw the necessity of rest, in order to be ready for the exertions of the morning.

After the party had broken up, which it did very contrary to the wishes of Messrs. Dodge and Monday, Mademoiselle Viefville pa.s.sed an hour in the state-room of Miss Effingham, during which time she made several supererogatory complaints of the manner in which the editor of the Active Inquirer had viewed things in Paris, besides asking a good many questions concerning his occupation and character.

"I am not quite certain, my dear mademoiselle, that I can give you a very learned description of the animal you think worthy of all these questions, but, by the aid of Mr. John Effingham's information, and a few words that have fallen from Mr. Blunt, I believe it ought to be something as follows:--America once produced a very distinguished philosopher, named Franklin--"

"Comment, ma chere! Tout le monde le connait!"

"--This Monsieur Franklin commenced life as a printer; but living to a great age, and rising to high employments, he became a philosopher in morals, as his studies had made him one in physics. Now, America is full of printers, and most of them fancy themselves Franklins, until time and failures teach them discretion."

"_Mais_ the world has not seen but _un seul Franklin!_"

"Nor is it likely to see another very soon. In America the young men are taught, justly enough, that by merit they may rise to the highest situations; and, always according to Mr. John Effingham, too many of them fancy that because they are at liberty to turn any high qualities they may happen to have to account, they are actually fit for anything. Even he allows this peculiarity of the country does much good, but he maintains that it also does much harm, by causing pretenders to start up in all directions. Of this cla.s.s he describes Mr. Dodge to be. This person, instead of working at the mechanical part of a press, to which he was educated, has the ambition to control its intellectual, and thus edits the Active Inquirer."

"It must be a very useful journal!"

"It answers his purposes, most probably. He is full of provincial ignorance, and provincial prejudices, you perceive; and, I dare say, he makes his paper the circulator of all these, in addition to the personal rancour, envy, and uncharitableness, that usually distinguish a pretension that mistakes itself for ambition. My cousin Jack affirms that America is filled with such as he."

"And, Monsieur Effingham?"

"Oh! my dear father is all mildness and charity, you snow, mademoiselle, and he only looks at the bright side of the picture, for he maintains that a great deal of good results from the activity and elasticity of such a state of things. While he confesses to a great deal of downright ignorance that is paraded as knowledge; to much narrow intolerance that is offensively prominent in the disguise of principle, and a love of liberty; and to vulgarity and personalities that wound all taste, and every sentiment of right, he insists on it that the main result is good."

"In such a case there is need of an umpire. You mentioned the opinion of Mr. Blunt. Comme ce jeune homme parle bien Francais!"

Eve hesitated, and she changed colour slightly, before she answered.

"I am not certain that the opinion of Mr. Blunt ought to be mentioned in opposition to those of my father and cousin Jack, on such a subject," she said. "He is very young, and it is, now, quite questionable whether he is even an American at all."

"Tant mieux, ma chere. He has been much in the country, and it is not the native that make the best judge, when the stranger has many opportunities of seeing."

"On this principle, mademoiselle, you are, then, to give up your own judgment about France, on all those points in which I have the misfortune to differ from you," said Eve, laughing.

"_Pas tout a fait_," returned the governess goodhumouredly. "Age and experience must pa.s.s _pour quelque chose. Et Monsieur Blunt_?--"

"Monsieur Blunt leans nearer to the side of cousin Jack, I fear, than to that of my dear, dear father. He says men of Mr. Dodge's character, propensities, malignancy, intolerance, ignorance, vulgarity, and peculiar vices abound in and about the American press. He even insists that they do an incalculable amount of harm, by influencing those who have no better sources of information; by setting up low jealousies and envy in the place of principles and the right; by subst.i.tuting--I use his own words, mademoiselle," said Eve, blushing with the consciousness of the fidelity of her memory--"by subst.i.tuting uninstructed provincial notions for true taste and liberality; by confounding the real principles of liberty with personal envies, and the jealousies of station; and by losing sight entirely of their duties to the public, in the effort to advance their own interests. He says that the government is in truth a _press-ocracy_, and a press-ocracy, too, that has not the redeeming merit of either principles, tastes, talents or knowledge."

"Ce Monsieur Blunt has been very explicit, and _suffisamment eloquent_,"

returned Mademoiselle Viefville, gravely; for the prudent governess did not fail to observe that Eve used language so very different from that which was habitual to her, as to make her suspect she quoted literally.

For the first time the suspicion was painfully awakened, that it was her duty to be more vigilant in relation to the intercourse between her charge and the two agreeable young men whom accident had given them as fellow-pa.s.sengers. After a short but musing pause, she again adverted to the subject of their previous conversation.

"Ce Monsieur Dodge, est il ridicule!"

"On that point at least, my dear mademoiselle, there can be no mistake.

And yet cousin Jack insists that this stuff will be given to his readers, as views of Europe worthy of their attention."

"Ce conte du roi!--mais, c'est trop fort!"

"With the coat laced at the seams, and the c.o.c.ked hat!"

"Et l'honorable Louis Philippe d'Orleans!"

"Orleans, mademoiselle; d'Orleans would be anti-republican."

Then the two ladies sat looking at each other a few moments in silence, when both, although of a proper _retenue_ of manner in general, burst into a hearty and long-continued fit of laughter. Indeed, so long did Eve, in the buoyancy of her young spirits, and her keen perception of the ludicrous, indulge herself, that her fair hair fell about her rosy cheeks, and her bright eyes fairly danced with delight.

Chapter XVI.