Part 15 (1/2)
LETTERS [Sidenote: _Walter Bagehot_]
The complete letter-writer is now an unknown animal. In the last century, when communications were difficult, and epistles rare, there were a great many valuable people who devoted a good deal of time to writing elaborate letters. You wrote letters to a man whom you knew nineteen years and a half ago, and told him what you had for dinner, and what your second cousin said, and how the crops got on. Every detail of life was described and dwelt on, and improved. The art of writing, at least of writing easily, was comparatively rare, which kept the number of such compositions within narrow limits. Sir Walter Scott says he knew a man who remembered that the London post-bag once came to Edinburgh with only one letter in it. One can fancy the solemn, conscientious elaborateness with which a person would write, with the notion that his letter would have a whole coach and a whole bag to itself, and travel two hundred miles alone, the exclusive object of a red guard's care. The only thing like it now--the deferential minuteness with which one public office writes to another, conscious that the letter will travel on her Majesty's service three doors down the pa.s.sage--sinks by comparison into cursory brevity.
No administrative reform will be able to bring even the official mind of these days into the grave inch-an-hour conscientiousness with which a confidential correspondent of a century ago related the growth of apples, the manufacture of jams, the appearance of flirtations, and other such-like things. All the ordinary incidents of an easy life were made the most of; a party was epistolary capital, a race a mine of wealth. So deeply sentimental was this intercourse that it was much argued whether the affections were created for the sake of ink, or ink for the sake of the affections. Thus it continued for many years, and the fruits thereof are written in the volumes of family papers, which daily appear, are prized as ”materials for the historian,” and consigned, as the case may be, to posterity or oblivion. All this has now pa.s.sed away. Mr. Rowland Hill is ent.i.tled to the credit, not only of introducing stamps, but also of destroying letters.
THE TRAGEDY [Sidenote: _Ingoldsby_]
Quaeque ipse miserrima vidi.--_Virgil_
Catherine of Cleves was a Lady of rank, She had lands and fine houses, and cash in the bank; She had jewels and rings, And a thousand smart things; Was lovely and young, With a rather sharp tongue, And she wedded a n.o.ble of high degree With the star of the order of _St. Esprit_; But the Duke de Guise Was, by many degrees, Her senior, and not very easy to please; He'd a sneer on his lip, and a scowl with his eye, And a frown on his brow,--and he look'd like a Guy,-- So she took to intriguing With Monsieur St. Megrin, A young man of fas.h.i.+on, and figure, and worth, But with no great pretensions to fortune or birth; He would sing, fence, and dance With the best man in France, And took his rappee with genteel _nonchalance_; He smiled, and he flattered, and flirted with ease, And was very superior to Monseigneur de Guise.
Now Monsieur St. Megrin was curious to know If the lady approved of his pa.s.sion or no; So without more ado, He put on his _surtout_, And went to a man with a beard like a Jew, One Signor Ruggieri, A cunning man near, he Could conjure, tell fortunes, and calculate tides, Perform tricks on the cards, and Heaven knows what besides, Bring back a stray'd cow, silver ladle, or spoon, And was thought to be thick with the Man in the Moon.
The Sage took his stand With his wand in his hand, Drew a circle, then gave the dread word of command, Saying solemnly--”_Presto!--Hey, quick!--c.o.c.k-a-lorum!_”
When the d.u.c.h.ess immediately popp'd up before 'em.
Just then a conjunction of Venus and Mars, Or something peculiar above in the stars, Attracted the notice of Signor Ruggieri, Who ”bolted,” and left him alone with his deary.-- Monsieur St. Megrin went down on his knees, And the d.u.c.h.ess shed tears large as marrow-fat peas, When,--fancy the shock,--a loud double-knock, Made the lady cry, ”Get up, you fool!--there's De Guise!”-- 'Twas his Grace, sure enough; So Monsieur, looking bluff, Strutted by, with his hat on, and fingering his ruff, While, unseen by either, away flew the dame Through the opposite key-hole, the same way she came; But, alack! and alas! A mishap came to pa.s.s, In her hurry she, somehow or other, let fall A new silk _bandana_ she'd worn as a shawl; She used it for drying Her bright eyes while crying, Ane blowing her nose, as her beau talk'd of dying!
Now the Duke, who had seen it so lately adorn her, And he knew the great C with the Crown in the corner, The instant he spied it, smoked something amiss, And said, with some energy, ”D---- it! what's this?”
He went home in a fume, And bounced into her room, Crying, ”So, Ma'am, I find I've some cause to be jealous!
Look here!--here's a proof you run after the fellows!
--Now take up that pen,--if it's bad choose a better,-- And write, as I dictate, this moment a letter To Monsieur--you know who!” The lady look'd blue; But replied with much firmness--”Hang me if I do!”
De Guise grasped her wrist With his great bony fist, And pinched it, and gave it so painful a twist, That his hard gauntlet the flesh went an inch in,-- She did not mind death, but she could not stand pinching; So she sat down and wrote This polite little note:--
”Dear Mister St. Megrin, The Chiefs of the League in Our house mean to dine This evening at nine; I shall, soon after ten, Slip away from the men, And you'll find me upstairs in the drawing-room then; Come up the back way, or those impudent thieves Of servants will see you; Yours CATHERINE OF CLEVES.”
She directed and sealed it, all pale as a ghost, And De Guise put it into the Twopenny Post.
St. Megrin had almost jumped out of his skin For joy that day when the post came in; He read the note through Then began it anew, And thought it almost too good news to be true.-- He clapp'd on his hat, And a hood over that, With a cloak to disguise him, and make him look fat; So great his impatience, from half after Four, He was waiting till Ten at De Guise's backdoor.
When he heard the great clock of St. Genevieve chime, He ran up the back staircase six steps at a time, He had scarce made his bow, He hardly knew how, When alas! and alack! There was no getting back, For the drawing-room door was bang'd to with a whack;--
In vain he applied To the handle and tried, Somebody or other had locked it outside!
And the d.u.c.h.ess in agony mourn'd her mishap: ”We are caught like a couple of rats in a trap.”
Now the d.u.c.h.ess's page, About twelve years of age, For so little a boy was remarkably sage; And, just in the nick, to their joy and amazement, Popp'd the gas-lighter's ladder close under the cas.e.m.e.nt.
But all would not do,--Though St. Megrin got through The window,--below stood De Guise and his crew.
And though never man was more brave than St. Megrin, Yet fighting a score is extremely fatiguing; He thrust _carte_ and _tierce_ Uncommonly fierce, But not Beelzebub's self could their cuira.s.ses pierce: While his doublet and hose, Being holiday clothes, Were soon cut through and through from his knees to his nose.
Still an old crooked sixpence the Conjurer gave him, From pistol and sword was sufficient to save him, But, when beat on his knees, That confounded De Guise Came behind with the ”fogle” that caused all this breeze, Whipp'd it tight round his neck, and, when backward he'd jerk'd him, The rest of the rascals jump'd on him and Burked him.
The poor little page, too, himself got no quarter, but Was served the same way, And was found the next day With his heels in the air, and his head in the water-b.u.t.t;