Part 28 (2/2)
”Yes, sir, she is.”
”Well, my good woman, suppose that you are a widow and are killed,”
(Mrs Marrot looked as if she would rather not suppose anything of the sort), ”what I ask, what becomes of your child?--Left a beggar; an absolute beggar!”
He looked quite triumphantly at Mrs Tipps and her companions, and waited a few seconds as if to allow the idea to exert its full force on them.
”But, sir,” observed Mrs Marrot meekly, ”supposin' that there do be an accident,” (she s.h.i.+vered a little), ”that ticket won't prevent me bein'
killed, you know?”
”No, ma'am, no; but it will prevent your sweet daughter from being left a beggar--that is, on the supposition that you are a widow.”
”W'ich I ain't sir, I'm happy to say,” remarked Mrs Marrot; ”but, sir, supposin' we was both of us killed--”
She paused abruptly as if she had committed a sin in merely giving utterance to the idea.
”Why, then, your other children would get the 500 pounds--or your heirs, whoever they may be. It's a splendid system that, of insurance against accident. Just look at _me_, now.” He spread out his hands and displayed himself, looking from one to the other as if he were holding up to admiration something rare and beautiful. ”Just look at _me_. I'm off on a tour of three months through England, Scotland, and Ireland-- not for my health, madam, as you may see--but for scientific purposes.
Well, what do I do? I go to the Railway Pa.s.sengers a.s.surance Company's Office, 64 Cornhill, London, (I like to be particular, you see, as becomes one who professes to be an amateur student of the exact sciences), and I take out what they call a Short Term Policy of Insurance against accidents of all kinds for a thousand pounds--1000 pounds, observe--for which I pay the paltry sum of 30 s.h.i.+llings--1 pound, 10 s.h.i.+llings. Well, what then? Away I go, leaving behind me, with perfect indifference, a wife and two little boys. Remarkable little boys, madam, I a.s.sure you. Perfect marvels of health and intelligence, both of 'em--two little boys, madam, which have not been equalled since Cain and Abel were born. Every one says so, with the exception of a few of the cynical and jaundiced among men and women.
And, pray, why am I so indifferent? Just because they are provided for.
They have a moderately good income secured to them as it is, and the 1000 pounds which I have insured on my life will render it a competence in the event of my being killed. It will add 50 pounds a year to their income, which happens to be the turning-point of comfort. And what of myself? Why, with a perfectly easy conscience, I may go and do what I please. If I get drowned in Loch Katrine--what matter? If I break my neck in the Gap of Dunloe--what matter? If I get lost and frozen on the steeps of Ben Nevis or Goatfell--what matter? If I am crushed to death in a railway accident, or get entangled in machinery and am torn to atoms--still I say, what matter? 1000 pounds must _at_ _once_ be paid down to my widow and children, and all because of the pitiful sum of 30 s.h.i.+llings.
”But suppose,” continued the enthusiastic man, deepening his tone as he became more earnest, ”suppose that I am _not_ killed, but only severely injured and mangled so as to be utterly unfit to attend to my worldly affairs--what then?”
Mrs Tipps shuddered to think of ”what then.”
”Why,” continued the enthusiastic gentleman, ”I shall in that case be allowed from the company 6 pounds a week, until recovered, or, in the event of my sinking under my injuries within three months after the accident, the whole sum of 1000 pounds will be paid to my family.”
Mrs Tipps smiled and nodded her head approvingly, but Mrs Marrot still looked dubious.
”But, sir,” she said, ”supposin' you don't get either hurt or killed?”
”Why then,” replied the elderly gentleman, ”I'm all right of course, and only 50 s.h.i.+llings out of pocket, which, you must admit, is but a trifling addition to the expenses of a three months' tour. Besides, have I not had three months of an easy mind, and of utter regardlessness as to my life and limbs? Have not my wife and boys had three months of easy minds and indifference to my life and limbs also! Is not all that cheaply purchased at 30 s.h.i.+llings? while the sum itself, I have the satisfaction of knowing, goes to increase the funds of that excellent company which enables you and me and thousands of others to become so easy-minded and reckless, and which, at the same time, pays its fortunate shareholders a handsome dividend.”
”Really, sir,” said Mrs Tipps, laughing, ”you talk so enthusiastically of this Insurance Company that I almost suspect you to be a director of it.”
”Madam,” replied the elderly gentleman with some severity, ”if I _were_ a director of it, which I grieve to say I am not, I should only be doing my simple duty to it and to you in thus urging it on your attention.
But I am altogether uninterested in it, except as a philanthropist. I see and feel that it does good to myself and to my fellow-men, _therefore_ I wish my fellow-men to appreciate it more highly than they do, for it not only insures against accident by railway, but against all kinds of accidents; while its arrangements are made to suit the convenience of the public in every possible way.”
”Why, madam,” he continued, kindling up again and polis.h.i.+ng his head violently, ”only think, for the small sum of 4 pounds paid annually, it insures that you shall have paid to your family, if you chance to be killed, the sum of 1000 pounds, or, if not killed, 6 pounds a week while you are totally laid up, and 1 pound, 10 s.h.i.+llings a week while you are only partially disabled. And yet, would you believe it, many persons who see the value of this, and begin the wise course of insurance, go on for only a few years and then foolishly give it up--disappointed, I presume, that no accident has happened to them! See, here is one of their pamphlets!”
He pulled a paper out of his pocket energetically, and put on a pair of gold spectacles, _through_ which he looked when consulting the pamphlet, and _over_ which he glanced when observing the effect of what he read on Mrs Tipps.
”What do I find--eh? ha--yes--here it is--a Cornish auctioneer pushed back a window shutter--these are the very words, madam--what more he did to that shutter, or what it did to him, is not told, but he must have come by _some_ damage, because he received 55 pounds. A London clerk got his eye injured by a hair-pin in his daughter's hair--how suggestive that is, madam! what a picture it calls up of a wearied toil-worn man fondling his child of an evening--pressing his cheek to her fair head-- and what a commentary it is (he became very stern here) on the use of such barbarous implements as hair-pins! I am not punning, madam; I am much too serious to pun; I should have used the word savage instead of barbarous.
”Now, what was the result? This company gave that clerk compensation to the extent of 26 pounds. Again, a medical pract.i.tioner fell through the floor of a room. It must have been a bad, as it certainly was a strange, fall--probably he was heavy and the floor decayed--at all events that fall procured him 120 pounds. A Cardiff agent was bathing his feet--why, we are not told, but imagination is not slow to comprehend the reason, when the severity of our climate is taken into account; he broke the foot-pan--a much less comprehensible thing--and the breaking of that foot-pan did him damage, for which he was compensated with 52 pounds, 16 s.h.i.+llings. Again, a merchant of Birkenhead was paid 20 pounds for playing with his children!”
<script>