The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green Part 20

--- * "A Bachelor of Arts", Act I.

[AN OXFORD FRESHMAN 141]

"Hullo, Pet!" returned Mr. Bouncer; "bring yourself to an anchor, my man." The Pet accordingly anch.o.r.ed himself by dropping on to the edge of a chair, and placing his hat underneath it; while Huz and Buz smelt suspiciously round his legs, and looked at him with an expression of countenance which bore a wonderful resemblance to that which they gazed upon.

"Never mind the dogs; they're amiable little beggars," observed Mr.

Bouncer, "and they never bite any one except in play. Now then, Pet, what sort of liquors are you given to? Here are Claret liquors, Port liquors, Sherry liquors, egg-flip liquors, Cup liquors. You pays your money, and you takes your choice!

"Well, sir, thankee!" replied the Pet, "I ain't no ways pertikler, but if you ~have~ sich a thing as a gla.s.s o' sperrits, I'd prefer that - if not objectionable."

"In course not, Pet! always call for what you like. We keep all sorts of liquors, and are allowed to get drunk on the premises.

Ain't we, Giglamps?" Firing this raking shot as he pa.s.sed our hero, little Mr. Bouncer dived into the cupboard which served as his wine-bin, and brought therefrom two bottles of brandy and whiskey which he set before the Pet. "If you like gin or rum, or cherry-brandy, or old old-tom, better than these liquors," said Mr.

Bouncer, astonishing the Pet with the resources of a College wine-cellar, "just say the word, and you shall have them. 'I can call spirits from the vasty deep;' as Shikspur says. How will you take it, Pet? Neat, or adulterated? Are you for ~callidum c.u.m~, or ~frigidum sine~ - for hot-with, or cold-without?"

"I generally takes my sperrits 'ot, sir - if not objectionable,"

replied the Pet deferentially. Whereupon Mr. Bouncer seizing his speaking-trumpet, roared through it from the top of the stairs, "Rob-ert! Rob-ert!" But, as Mr. Filcher did not answer the summons, Mr. Bouncer threw up the window of his room, and bellowed out "Rob-ert" in tones which must have been perfectly audible in the High Street. "Doose take the feller, he's always over at the b.u.t.tery;"

said the incensed gentleman.

"I'll go up to old Sloe's room, and get his kettle," said Mr. Smalls; "he teas all day long to keep himself awake for reading. If he don't mind, he'll blow himself up with his gunpowder tea before he can take his double-first."

By the time Mr. Smalls had re-appeared with the kettle, Mr. Filcher had thought it prudent to answer his master's summons.

"Did you call, sir?" asked the scout, as though he was doubtful on that point.

[142 ADVENTURES OF MR. VERDANT GREEN]

"Call!" said Mr. Bouncer, with great irony; "oh, no! of course not! I should rather think not! Do you suppose that you are kept here that parties may have the chance of hollering out their lungs for you?

Don't answer me, sir! but get some hot water, and some more gla.s.ses; and be quick about it." Mr. Filcher was gone immediately; and, in three minutes, everything was settled to Mr. Bouncer's satisfaction, and he gave Mr. Filcher farther orders to bring up coffee and anchovy toast, at half-past eight o'clock. "Now, Pet, my beauty!" said the little gentleman, "you just walk into the liquors; because you've got some toughish work before you, you know."

The Pet did not require any pressing, but did as he was told; and, bestowing a collective nod on the company, drank their healths with the prefatory remark, "I looks to-~wards~ you gents!"

"Will you poke a smipe, Pet?" asked Mr. Bouncer, rather enigmatically; but, as he at the same time placed before Pet a "yard of clay" and a box of cigars, the professor of the art of self-defence perceived that he was asked to smoke a pipe.

"That's right, Pet!" said the Honourable Flexible Shanks, condescendingly, as the prizefighter scientifically filled the bowl of his pipe; "I'm glad to see you join us in a bit of smoke. We're all ~Baccy~-nalians now!" "Shanks, you're incorrigible!" said Charles Larkyns; "and don't you remember what the ~Oxford Parodies~ say?" and in his clear, rich voice, Mr. Larkyns sang the two following verses to the air of "Love not:"-

Smoke not, smoke not, your weeds nor pipes of clay!

Cigars they are made from leaves of cauliflowers;-

[AN OXFORD FRESHMAN 143]

Things that are doomed no duty e'er to pay;- Grown, made, and smoked in a few short hours.

Smoke not - smoke not!

Smoke not, smoke not, the weed you smoke may change The healthfulness of your stomachic tone; Things to the eye grow queer and pa.s.sing strange; All thoughts seem undefined - save one - to be alone!

Smoke not - smoke not!

"I know what you're thinking about, Giglamps," said Mr. Bouncer, as Charles Larkyns ceased his parody amid an approving clatter of gla.s.ses; "you were thinking of your first weed on the night of Smalls' quiet party: wer'nt you now, old feller? Ah, you've learnt to poke a smipe, beautiful, since then. Pet, here's your health.

I'll give you a toast and s~i~ntiment, gentlemen. May the Gown give the Town a jolly good hiding!" The sentiment was received with great applause, and the toast was drunk with all the honours, and followed by the customary but inappropriate chorus, "For he's a jolly good fellow!" without the singing of which Mr. Bouncer could not allow any toast to pa.s.s.

"How many cads could you lick at once, one off and the other on?"

asked Mr. Fosbrooke of the Pet, with the air of Boswell when he wanted to draw out the Doctor.

"Well, sir," said the Pet, with the modesty of true genius, "I wouldn't be pertickler to a score or so, as long as I'd got my back well up agin some'ut, and could hit out."

"What an effective tableau it would be!" observed Mr. Foote, who had always an eye to dramatic situations. "Enter the Pet, followed by twenty townspeople. First T.P. - Yield, traitor! Pet - Never! the man who would yield when ordered to do so, is unworthy the name of a Pet and an Englishman! Floors the twenty T.P.'s one after the other.

Tableau, blue fire. Why, it would surpa.s.s the British sailor's broadsword combat for six, and bring down the house."

"Talking of bringing down", said Mr. Blades, "did you remember to bring down a cap and gown for the Pet, as I told you?"

"Well, I believe those ~were~ the stage directions," answered Mr.

Foote; "but, really, the wardrobe was so ill provided that it would only supply a cap. But perhaps that will do for a super."

"If by a super you mean a supernumerary, Footelights," said Mr.

Cheke, the gentleman Commoner of Corpus, "then the Pet isn't one.

He's the leading character of what you would call the ~dramatis personae.~"

"True," replied Mr. Foote, "he's cast for the hero; though he will create a new ~role~ as the walking-into-them gentleman."

"You see, Footelights," said Mr. Blades, "that the Pet is to

[144 ADVENTURES OF MR. VERDANT GREEN]

lead our forces; and we depend upon him to help us on to victory: and we must put him into academicals, not only because the town cads must think he is one of us, but also because the proctors might otherwise deprive us of his services - and old Towzer, the Senior Proctor, in particular, is sure to be all alive. Who's got an old gown?"

"I will lend mine with pleasure," said Mr. Verdant Green.

"But you'll want it yourself," said Mr. Blades.

"Why, thank you," faltered our hero, "I'd rather, I think, keep within college. I can see the - the fun - yes, the fun - from the window."

"Oh, blow it, Giglamps!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr. Bouncer, "you'll never go to do the mean, and show the white feather, will you?"

"Music expressive of trepidation," murmured Mr. Foote, by way of parenthesis.

"But," pursued our hero, apologetically, "there will be, I dare say, a large crowd."

"A very powerful ~caste~, no doubt," observed Mr. Foote.

"And I may get my - yes, my spectacles broken; and then" -

"And then, Giglamps," said Mr. Bouncer, "why, and then you shall be presented with another pair as a testimonial of affection from yours truly. Come, Giglamps, don't do the mean! a man of your standing, and with a chest like that!" and the little gentleman sounded on our hero's shirt-front, as doctors do when they stethoscope a patient.

"Come, Giglamps, old feller, you mustn't refuse. You didn't ought to was, as Shakespeare says."

"Pardon me! Not Shakespeare, but Wright, in the 'Green Bushes,' "

interrupted Mr. Foote, who was as painfully anxious as Mr. Payne Collier himself that the text of the great poet should be free from corruptions.