now in his thread-bare suit.
I can fancy the young man striding into the room where his lordship's guests
were assembled. In the presence of great or small, Philip has always been
entirely unconcerned, and he is one of the half-dozen men I have seen in my life
upon whom rank made no impression. It appears that, on occasion of this
breakfast, there were one or two dandies present who were aghast at Philip's
freedom of behaviour. He engaged in conversation with a famous French statesman;
contradicted him with much energy in his own language; and when the statesman
asked whether monsieur was membre du Parlement? Philip burst into one of his
roars of laughter, which almost breaks the glasses on a table, and said, "Je
suis journaliste, monsieur, � vos ordres!" Young Timbury, of the Embassy, was
aghast at Philip's insolence; and Dr. Botts, his lordship's travelling
physician, looked at him with a terrified face. A bottle of claret was brought,
which almost all the gentlemen present began to swallow, until Philip, tasting
his glass, called out, "Faugh. It's corked!" "So it is, and very badly corked,"
growls my lord, with one of his usual oaths. "Why didn't some of you fellows
speak? Do you like corked wine?" There were gallant fellows round that table who
would have drunk corked black dose, had his lordship professed to like senna.
The old host was tickled and amused. "Your mother was a quiet soul, and your
father used to bow like a dancing-master. You ain't much like him. I dine at
home most days. Leave word in the morning with my people, and come when you
like, Philip," he growled. A part of this news Philip narrated to us in his
letter, and other part was given verbally by Mr. and Mrs. Mugford on their
return to London. "I tell you, sir," says Mugford, "he has been taken by the
hand by some of the tiptop people, and I have booked him at three guineas a week
for a letter to the Pall Mall Gazette."
And this was the cause of my wife's exultation and triumphant "Didn't I tell
you?" Philip's foot was on the ladder; and who so capable of mounting to the
top? When happiness and a fond and lovely girl were waiting for him there, would
he lose heart, spare exertion, or be afraid to climb? He had no truer
well-wisher than myself, and no friend who liked him better, though, I daresay,
many admired him much more than I did. But these were women for the most part;
and women become so absurdly unjust and partial to persons whom they love, when
these latter are in misfortune, that I am surprised Mr. Philip did not quite
lose his head in his poverty, with such fond flatterers and sycophants round
about him. Would you grudge him the consolation to be had from these sweet uses
of adversity? Many a heart would be hardened but for the memory of past griefs;
when eyes, now averted, perhaps, were full of sympathy, and hands, now cold,
were eager to soothe and succour.
CHAPTER III. QU'ON EST BIEN A VINGT ANS.
In an old album, which we have at home, a friend has made various sketches of
Philip, Charlotte, and all our family circle. To us oldsters the days we are
describing seem but as yesterday; yet as I look at the drawings and recal my
friend, and ourselves, and the habits in which we were dressed some twenty years
since, I can't but think what a commotion we should create were we to enter our
own or our neighbour's drawing-room in those garments which appeared perfectly
becoming in the year 1840. What would be a woman without a crinoline petticoat,
for example? an object ridiculous, hateful, I suppose hardly proper. What would
you think of a hero who wore a large high black-satin stock cascading over a
figured silk waistcoat; and a blue dress-coat, with brass buttons, mayhap? If a
person so attired came up to ask you to dance, could you refrain from laughing?
Time was, when young men so decorated found favour in the eyes of damsels who
had never beheld hooped petticoats, except in their grandmothers' portraits.
Persons who flourished in the first part of the century never thought to see the
hoops of our ancestors' age rolled downwards to our contemporaries and children.
Did we ever imagine that a period would arrive when our young men would part
their hair down the middle, and wear a piece of tape for a neckcloth? As soon
should we have thought of their dyeing their bodies with woad, and arraying
themselves like ancient Britons. So the ages have their dress and undress; and
the gentlemen and ladies of Victoria's time are satisfied with their manner of
raiment; as no doubt in Boadicea's court they looked charming tattooed and
painted blue.
The times of which we write, the times of Louis Philippe the king, are so
altered from the present, that when Philip Firmin went to Paris it was
absolutely a cheap place to live in; and he has often bragged in subsequent days
of having lived well during a month for five pounds, and bought a neat waistcoat
with a part of the money. "A capital bed-room, au premier, for a franc a day,
sir," he would call all persons to remark, "a bedroom as good as yours, my lord,
at Meurice's. Very good tea or coffee breakfast, twenty francs a month, with
lots of bread and butter. Twenty francs a month for washing, and fifty for
dinner and pocket-money��that's about the figure. The dinner, I own, is shy,
unless I come and dine with my friends; and then I make up for banyan days." And
so saying Philip would call out for more truffled partridges, or affably filled
his goblet with my Lord Ringwood's best Sillery. "At those shops," he would
observe, "where I dine, I have beer: I can't stand the wine. And you see, I
can't go to the cheap English ordinaries, of which there are many, because
English gentlemen's servants are there, you know, and it's not pleasant to sit
with a fellow who waits on you the day after."
"Oh! the English servants go to the cheap ordinaries, do they?" asks my lord,
greatly amused, "and you drink bi�re de Mars at the shop where you dine?"
"And dine very badly, too, I can tell you. Always come away hungry. Give me some
champagne��the dry, if you please. They mix very well together�� sweet and dry.
Did you ever dine at Flicoteau's, Mr. Pecker?"
"I dine at one of your horrible two-franc houses?" cries Mr. Pecker, with a look
of terror. "Do you know, my lord, there are actually houses where people dine
for two francs?"
"Two francs! Seventeen sous!" bawls out Mr. Firmin. "The soup, the beef, the
r�ti, the salad, the dessert, and the whitey-brown bread at discretion. It's not
a good dinner, certainly��in fact, it is a dreadful bad one. But to dine so
would do some fellows a great deal of good."
"What do you say, Pecker? Flicoteau's; seventeen sous. We'll make a little party
and try, and Firmin shall do the honours of his restaurant," says my lord, with
a grin.
"Mercy!" gasps Mr. Pecker.
"I had rather dine here, if you please, my lord," says the young man. "This is
cheaper, and certainly better."
My lord's doctor, and many of the guests at his table, my lord's henchmen,
flatterers, and led captains, looked aghast at the fre
edom of the young fellow
in the shabby coat. If they dared to be familiar with their host, there came a
scowl over that noble countenance which was awful to face. They drank his corked
wine in meekness of spirit. They laughed at his jokes trembling. One after
another, they were the objects of his satire; and each grinned piteously, as he
took his turn of punishment. Some dinners are dear, though they cost nothing. At
some great tables are not toads served along with the entr�es? Yes, and many
amateurs are exceedingly fond of the dish.
How do Parisians live at all? is a question which has often set me wondering.
How do men, in public offices, with fifteen thousand francs, let us say, for a
salary��and this, for a French official, is a high salary��live in handsome
apartments; give genteel entertainments; clothe themselves and their families
with much more sumptuous raiment than English people of the same station can
afford; take their country holiday, a six weeks' sojourn aux eaux; and appear
cheerful and to want for nothing? Paterfamilias, with six hundred a year in
London, knows what a straitened life his is, with rent high, and beef at a
shilling a pound. Well, in Paris, rent is higher, and meat is dearer; and yet
madame is richly dressed when you see her; monsieur has always a little money in
his pocket for his club or his caf�; and something is pretty surely put away
every year for the marriage portion of the young folks. "Sir," Philip used to
say, describing this period of his life, on which and on most subjects regarding
himself, by the way, he was wont to be very eloquent, "when my income was raised
to five thousand francs a year, I give you my word I was considered to be rich
by my French acquaintance. I gave four sous to the waiter at our
dining-place:��in that respect I was always ostentatious:��and I believe they
wealthy in the Luxembourg quarter. Don't tell me about poverty, sir! Poverty is
a bully if you are afraid of her, or truckle to her. Poverty is good-natured
enough if you meet her like a man. You saw how my poor old father was afraid of
her, and thought the world would come to an end if Dr. Firmin did not keep his
butler, and his footman, and his fine house, and fine chariot and horses? He was
a poor man, if you please. He must have suffered agonies in his struggle to make
both ends meet. Everything he bought must have cost him twice the honest price;
and when I think of nights that must have been passed without sleep��of that
proud man having to smirk and cringe before creditors��to coax butchers, by
George, and wheedle tailors��I pity him: I can't be angry any more. That man has
suffered enough. As for me, haven't you remarked that since I have not a guinea
in the world, I swagger, and am a much greater swell than before?" And the truth
is, that a Prince Royal could not have called for his gens with a more
magnificent air than Mr. Philip when he summoned the waiter, and paid for his
petit verre.
Talk of poverty, indeed! That period, Philip vows, was the happiest of his life.
He liked to tell in after days of the choice acquaintance of Bohemians which he
had formed. Their jug, he said, though it contained but small beer, was always
full. Their tobacco, though it bore no higher rank than that of caporal, was
plentiful and fragrant. He knew some admirable medical students; some artists
who only wanted talent and industry to be at the height of their profession; and
one or two of the magnates of his own calling, the newspaper correspondents,
whose houses and tables were open to him. It was wonderful what secrets of
politics he learned and transmitted to his own paper. He pursued French
statesmen of those days with prodigious eloquence and vigour. At the expense of
that old king he was wonderfully witty and sarcastical. He reviewed the affairs
of Europe, settled the destinies of Russia, denounced the Spanish marriages,
disposed of the Pope, and advocated the liberal cause in France, with an
untiring eloquence. "Absinthe used to be my drink, sir," so he was good enough
to tell his friends. "It makes the ink run, and imparts a fine eloquence to the
style. Mercy upon us, how I would belabour that poor King of the French under
the influence of absinthe, in that caf� opposite the Bourse where I used to make
my letter! Who knows, sir, perhaps the influence of those letters precipitated
the fall of the Bourbon dynasty! Before I had an office, Gilligan, of the
Century, and I used to do our letters at that caf�; we compared notes and
pitched into each other amicably.
Gilligan of the Century, and Firmin of the Pall Mall Gazette, were, however,
very minor personages amongst the London newspaper correspondents. Their seniors
of the daily press had handsome apartments, gave sumptuous dinners, were
closeted with ministers' secretaries, and entertained members of the Chamber of
Deputies. Philip, on perfectly easy terms with himself and the world, swaggering
about the embassy balls��Philip, the friend and relative of Lord Ringwood��was
viewed by his professional seniors and superiors with an eye of favour, which
was not certainly turned on all gentlemen following his calling. Certainly poor
Gilligan was never asked to those dinners, which some of the newspaper
ambassadors gave, whereas Philip was received not inhospitably. Gilligan
received but a cold shoulder at Mrs. Morning Messenger's Thursdays; and as for
being asked to dinner, "Bedad, that fellow Firmin has an air with him which will
carry him through anywhere!" Phil's brother correspondent owned. "He seems to
patronize an ambassador when he goes up and speaks to him; and he says to a
secretary, 'My good fellow, tell your master that Mr. Firmin, of the Pall Mall
Gazette, wants to see him, and will thank him to step over to the Caf� de la
Bourse.'" I don't think Philip for his part would have seen much matter of
surprise in a minister stepping over to speak to him. To him all folk were
alike, great and small: and it is recorded of him that when, on one occasion,
Lord Ringwood paid him a visit at his lodgings in the Faubourg St. Germain,
Philip affably offered his lordship a cornet of fried potatoes, with which, and
plentiful tobacco of course, Philip and one or two of his friends were regaling
themselves when Lord Ringwood chanced to call on his kinsman.
A crust and a carafon of small beer, a correspondence with a weekly paper, and a
more than this pittance, and not to seek for more permanent and lucrative
employment? Some of his friends at home were rather vexed at what Philip chose
to consider his good fortune; namely, his connection with the newspaper and the
small stipend it gave him. He might quarrel with his employer any day. Indeed no
man was more likely to fling his bread and butter out of window than Mr. Philip.
He was losing precious time at the bar; where he, as hundreds of other poor
gentlemen had done before him, might make a career for himself. For what are
colonies m
ade? Why do bankruptcies occur? Why do people break the peace and
quarrel with policemen, but that barristers may be employed as judges,
commissioners, magistrates? A reporter to a newspaper remains all his life a
newspaper reporter. Philip, if he would but help himself, had friends in the
world who might aid effectually to advance him. So it was we pleaded with him,
in the language of moderation, urging the dictates of common sense. As if
moderation and common sense could be got to move that mule of a Philip Firmin;
as if any persuasion of ours could induce him to do anything but what he liked
to do best himself!
"That you should be worldly, my poor fellow" (so Philip wrote to his present
biographer)��"that you should be thinking of money and the main chance, is no
matter of surprise to me. You have suffered under that curse of manhood, that
destroyer of generosity in the mind, that parent of selfishness��a little
fortune. You have your wretched hundreds" (my candid correspondent stated the
sum correctly enough; and I wish it were double or treble; but that is not here
the point:) "paid quarterly. The miserable pittance numbs your whole existence.
It prevents freedom of thought and action. It makes a screw of a man who is
certainly not without generous impulses, as I know, my poor old Harpagon: for
hast thou not offered to open thy purse to me? I tell you I am sick of the way
in which people in London, especially good people, think about money. You live
up to your income's edge. You are miserably poor. You brag and flatter
yourselves that you owe no man anything; but your estate has creditors upon it
as insatiable as any usurer, and as hard as any bailiff. You call me reckless,
and prodigal, and idle, and all sorts of names, because I live in a single room,
do as little work as I can, and go about with holes in my boots: and you flatter
yourself you are prudent, because you have a genteel house, a grave flunkey out
of livery, and two greengrocers to wait when you give your half-dozen dreary
dinner parties. Wretched man! You are a slave: not a man. You are a pauper, with
a good house and good clothes. You are so miserably prudent, that all your money
is spent for you, except the few wretched shillings which you allow yourself for
pocket-money. You tremble at the expense of a cab. I believe you actually look
at half-a-crown before you spend it. The landlord is your master. The
livery-stablekeeper is your master. A train of ruthless, useless servants are
your pitiless creditors, to whom you have to pay exorbitant dividends every day.
I, with a hole in my elbow, who live upon a shilling dinner, and walk on cracked
boot soles, am called extravagant, idle, reckless, I don't know what; while you,
forsooth, consider yourself prudent. Miserable delusion! You are flinging away
heaps of money on useless flunkeys, on useless maid servants, on useless
lodgings, on useless finery��and you say, 'Poor Phil! what a sad idler he is!
how he flings himself away! in what a wretched, disreputable manner he lives!'
Poor Phil is as rich as you are, for he has enough, and is content. Poor Phil
can afford to be idle, and you can't. You must work in order to keep that great
hulking footman, that great rawboned cook, that army of babbling nursery-maids,
and I don't know what more. And if you choose to submit to the slavery and
degradation inseparable from your condition; ��the wretched inspection of
candle-ends, which you call order;��the mean self-denials, which you must daily
practise��I pity you, and don't quarrel with you. But I wish you would not be so
insufferably virtuous, and ready with your blame and pity for me. If I am happy,
pray need you be disquieted? Suppose I prefer independence, and shabby boots?
Are not these better than to be pinched by your abominable varnished