The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green Part 44

When Mr. Bouncer had refreshed his inner man, and strengthened himself for his severe course of reading by the consumption of a singular mixture of coffee and kidneys, beef-steaks and beer; and when he had rested from his exertions, and had resumed his pipe - which was not "the judicious Hooker," but a short clay, smoked to a swarthy hue, and on that account, as well as from its presumed medicatory power, called "the Black Doctor," - just then, Mr. Smalls, and a detachment of invited guests, who had been to an early lecture, dropped in to breakfast. Huz and Buz, setting up a terrific bark, darted towards a minute specimen of the canine species, which, with the aid of a powerful microscope, might have been discovered at the feet of its proud proprietor, Mr. Smalls. It was the first dog of its kind imported into Oxford, and it was destined to set on foot a fashion that soon bade fair to drive out of the field those long-haired Skye-terriers, with two or three specimens of which species, he entered the room.

"Kill 'em, Lympy!" said Mr. Smalls to his pet, who, with an extreme display of pugnacity, was submitting to the curious and minute inspection of Huz and Buz. "Lympy" was a black and tan terrier, with smooth hair, glossy coat, bead-like eyes, cropped ears, pointed tail, limbs of a cobwebby structure,

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and so diminutive in its proportions, that its owner was accustomed to carry it inside the breast of his waistcoat, as a precaution, probably, against its being blown away. And it was called "Lympy,"

as an abbreviation of "Olympus," which was the name derisively given to it for its smallness, on the ~lucus a non lucendo~ principle that miscalls the lengthy "brief" of the barrister, the "living" - not-sufficient-to-support-life - of the poor vicar, the uncertain "certain age," the unfair "fare" and the son-ruled "governor."

"Lympy" was placed upon the table, in order that he might be duly admired; an exaltation at which Huz and Buz and the Skye-terriers chafed with jealousy. "Be quiet, you beggars! he's prettier than you!" said Mr. Smalls; whereupon, a mild punster present propounded the canine query, "Did it ever occur to a cur to be lauded to the Skyes?" at which there was a shout of indignation, and he was sconced by the unanimous vote of the company.

"Lympy ain't a bad style of dog," said little Mr. Bouncer, as he puffed away at the Black Doctor. "He'd be perfect, if he hadn't one fault." "And what's his fault, pray?" asked his anxious owner.

"There's rather too much of him!" observed Mr. Bouncer, gravely.

"Robert!" shouted the little gentleman to his scout; "Robert! doose take the feller, he's always out of the way when he's wanted." And, when the performance of a variety of octaves on the post-horn, combined with the free use of the speaking-trumpet, had brought Mr.

Robert Filcher to his presence, Mr. Bouncer received him with objurgations, and ordered another tankard of beer from the b.u.t.tery.

In the meantime, the conversation had taken a sporting turn. "Do you meet Drake's to-morrow?" asked Mr. Blades of Mr. Four-in-hand Fosbrooke.

"No! the old Berkshire," was the reply. "Where's the meet?"

"At Buscot Park. I send my horse to Thompson's, at the Farringdon-Road station, and go to meet him by rail."

"And, what about the Grind?" asked Mr. Smalls of the company generally.'

"Oh yes!" said Mr. Bouncer, "let us talk over the Grind. Giglamps, old feller, you must join."

"Certainly, if you wish it," said Mr. Verdant Green, who,

[AN OXFORD FRESHMAN 301]

however, had as little idea as the man in the moon what they were talking about. But, as he was no longer a Freshman, he was unwilling to betray his ignorance on any matter pertaining to college life; so he looked much wiser than he felt, and saved himself from saying more on the subject, by sipping a hot spiced draught from a silver cup that was pushed round to him. "That's the very cup that Four-in-hand Fosbrooke won at the last Grind," said Mr. Bouncer.

"Was it indeed!" safely answered Mr. Verdant Green, who looked at the silver cup (on which was engraven a coat of arms with the words "Brazenface Grind.- Fosbrooke,"), and wondered what "a Grind" might be. A medical student would have told [him] that a "Grind" meant the reading up for an examination [under] the tuition of one who was familiarly termed "a Grinder" - a process which Mr. Verdant Green's friends would phrase as "Coaching" under "a Coach;" but the conversation that followed upon Mr. Smalls' introduction of the subject, made our hero aware, that, to a University man, a Grind did not possess any reading signification, but a riding one. In fact, it was a steeple-chase, slightly varying in its details according to the college that patronized the pastime. At Brazenface, "the Grind" was usually over a known line of country, marked out with flags by the gentleman (familiarly known as Anniseed) who attended to this business, and full of leaps of various kinds, and various degrees of stiffness. By sweepstakes and subscriptions, a sum of from ten to fifteen pounds was raised for the purchase of a silver cup, wherewith to grace the winner's wines and breakfast parties; but, as the winner had occasionally been known to pay as much as fifteen pounds for the day's hire of the blood horse who was to land him first at the goal, and as he had, moreover, to discharge many other little expenses, including the by no means little one of a dinner to the losers, the conqueror for the cup usually obtained more glory than profit.

"I suppose you'll enter ~Tearaway~, as before?" asked Mr. Smalls of Mr. Fosbrooke.

"Yes! for I want to get him in condition for the Aylesbury steeple-chase," replied the owner of ~Tearaway~, who was rather too fond of vaunting his blue silk and black cap before the eyes of the sporting public.

"You've not much to fear from this man," said Mr. Bouncer, indicating (with the Black Doctor) the stalwart form of Mr.

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Blades. "Billy's too big in the Westphalias. Giglamps, you're the boy to cook Fosbrooke's goose. Don't you remember what old father-in-law Honeywood told you, - that you might, would, should, and could, ride like a Shafto? and lives there a man with soul so dead, - as Shikspur or some other cove observes - who wouldn't like to show what stuff he was made of? I can put you up to a wrinkle," said the little gentleman, sinking his voice to a whisper. "Tollitt has got a mare who can lick ~Tearaway~ into fits. She is as easy as a chair, and jumps like a cat. All that you have to do is to sit back, clip the pig-skin, and send her at it; and, she'll take you over without touching a twig. He'd promised her to me, but I intend to cut the Grind altogether; it interferes too much, don't you see, with my coaching. So I can make Tollitt keep her for you. Think how well the cup would look on your side-board, when you've blossomed into a parient, and changed the adorable Patty into Mrs. Verdant. Think of that, Master Giglamps!"

Mr. Bouncer's argument was a persuasive one, and Mr. Verdant Green consented to be one of the twelve gentlemen, who cheerfully paid their sovereigns to be allowed to make their appearance as amateur jockeys at the forthcoming Grind. After much debate, "the Wet Ensham course" was decided upon; and three o'clock in the afternoon of that day fortnight was fixed for the start. Mr. Smalls gained ~kudos~ by offering to give the luncheon at his rooms; and the host of the Red Lion, at Ensham, was ordered to prepare one of his very best dinners, for the winding up of the day's sport.

"I don't mind paying for it," said Verdant to Mr. Bouncer, "if I can but win the cup, and show it to Patty, when she comes to us at Christmas."

"Keep your p.e.c.k.e.r up, old feller! and put your trust in old beans,"

was Mr.Bouncer's reply.

CHAPTER XII.

MR. VERDANT GREEN TAKES HIS DEGREE.

DURING the fortnight that intervened between Mr. Bouncer's breakfast party and the Grind, Mr. Verdant Green got himself into training for his first appearance as a steeple-chase rider, by practising a variety of equestrian feats over leaping-bars and gorse stuck hurdles; in which he acquitted himself with tolerable success, and came off with fewer bruises than might have been expected. At this period of his career, too, he strengthened his bodily powers by practising himself in those varieties of the "manly exercises" that found most favour in Oxford.

[AN OXFORD FRESHMAN 303]

The adoption of some portion of these was partly attributable to his having been made a Mason; for, whenever he attended the meetings of his Lodge, he had to pa.s.s the two rooms where Mr. MacLaren conducted his fencing-school and gymnasium. The fencing-room - which was the larger of the two, and was of the same dimensions as the Lodge-room above it - was usually tenanted by the proprietor and his a.s.sistant (who, as Mr. Bouncer phrased it, "put the pupils through their paces,") and re-echoed to the sounds of stampings, and the cries of "On guard! quick! parry! lunge!" with the various other terms of Defence and Attack, uttered in French and English. At the upper end of the room, over the fire-place, was a stand of curious arms, flanked on either side by files of single-sticks. The centre of the room was left clear for the fencing; while the lower end was occupied by the parallel bars, a regiment of Indian clubs, and a mattress apparatus for the delectation of the sect of jumpers.

Here Mr. Verdant Green, properly equipped for the purpose, was accustomed to swing his clubs after the presumed Indian manner, to lift himself off his feet and hang suspended between the parallel bars, to leap the string on to the mattress, to be rapped and thumped with single-sticks and boxing-gloves by any one else than Mr. Blades (who had developed his muscles in a most formidable manner), and to go through his parades of ~quarte~ and ~tierce~ with the flannel-

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clothed a.s.sistant. Occasionally he had a fencing bout with the good-humoured Mr. MacLaren, who - professionally protected by his padded leathern ~plastron~ - politely and obligingly did his best to a.s.sure him, both by precept and example, of the truth of the wise old saw, "mens sana in corpore sano."

The lower room at MacLaren's presented a very different appearance to the fencing-room. The wall to the right hand, as well as a part of the wall at the upper end, was hung around - not

"With pikes, and guns, and bows,"

like the fine old English gentleman's, - but nevertheless,

"With swords, and good old cutla.s.ses,"

and foils, and fencing masks, and fencing gloves, and boxing gloves, and pads, and belts, and light white shoes. Opposite to the door, was the vaulting-horse, on whose wooden back the gymnasiast sprang at a bound, and over which the tyro (with the aid of the spring-board) usually pitched himself headlong. Then, commencing at the further end, was a series of poles and ropes - the turning pole, the hanging poles, the rings, and the ~trapeze~, - on either or all of which the pupil could exercise himself; and, if he had the skill so to do, could jerk himself from one to the other, and finally hang himself upon the sloping ladder, before the momentum of his spring had pa.s.sed away.

Mr. Bouncer, who could do most things with his hands and feet, was a very distinguished pupil of Mr. MacLaren's; for the little gentleman was as active as a monkey, and - to quote his own remarkably figurative expression - was "a great deal livelier than ~the Bug and b.u.t.terfly~."*

Mr. Bouncer, then, would go through the full series of gymnastic performances, and finally pull himself up the rounds of the ladder, with the greatest apparent ease, much to the envy of Mr. Verdant Green, who, bathed in perspiration, and nearly dislocating every bone in his body, would vainly struggle (in

--- * A name given to Mr. Hope's Entomological Museum.

[AN OXFORD FRESHMAN 305]

att.i.tudes like to those of "the perspiring frog" of Count Smorltork) to imitate his mercurial friend, and would finally drop exhausted on the padded floor.

And, Mr. Verdant Green did not confine himself to these indoor amus.e.m.e.nts; but studied the Oxford Book of Sports in various out-of-door ways. Besides his Grinds, and cricketing, and boating, and hunting, he would paddle down to Wyatt's for a little pistol practice, or to indulge in the exciting amus.e.m.e.nt of rifle-shooting at empty bottles, or to practise, on the leaping and swinging poles, the lessons he was learning at MacLaren's, or to play at skittles with Mr. Bouncer (who was very expert in knocking down three out of the four); or to kick football until he became (to use Mr. Bouncer's expression) "as stiff as a biscuit."

Or, he would attend the shooting parties given by William Brown, Esquire, of University House; where blue-rocks and brown rabbits were turned out of traps for the sport of the a.s.sembled bipeds and quadrupeds. The luckless pigeons and rabbits had but a poor chance for their lives; for, if the gentleman who paid for the privilege of the shot missed his rabbit (which was within the bounds of probability) the other guns were at once discharged, and the dogs of