Sylvester Sound the Somnambulist/Chapter 23

Ignorance is universally contemned, and yet ignorance itself is universal. There is nothing more fiercely denounced than ignorance: yet, in general, they are most ignorant who denounce it most fiercely. All men are ignorant: and yet mankind is not a mass of ignorance; all men have knowledge: but man is not omniscient. Ignorance is comparative: there is not a man breathing who does not know something of which every other man breathing is ignorant. The great art is to conceal our ignorance; and this art is highly valuable, seeing that it constitutes the germ of knowledge: nay, the man who endeavours to conceal his ignorance, is already in possession of a most important branch of human knowledge—the knowledge of the ignorance he is anxious to conceal. Some men have a talent for the display of their ignorance. Such men are ignorant of their ignorance, and are consequently much to be pitied. To be ignorant of one's own ignorance is to be in the most profound state of ignorance in which a man can be involved. The common answer, "I don't know," is candid, but it is at the same time a very palpable manifestation of ignorance—and yet where, is the man who knows everything? There is not such a man upon earth. The lowest species of ignorance is that which prompts a man to think that he knows everything: and the highest caste of knowledge is that which makes him feel that in reality he knows only this—that he knows nothing. There are, however, men who are expected to know everything; but of this expectation disappointment must always be the fruit. Take our greatest men-men of the mightiest minds-men most highly distinguished for wisdom—how ignorant they are of those common things with which common men are conversant. A journeyman barber would curl his lip and look with feelings of contempt upon a head of hair cut by an astronomer: his exclamation doubtless would be, "He must be a hignoramus as cut this ear air!" Nor is it unworthy of belief that there is not one statesman in a thousand, either native or foreign, who knows how to cut out a pair of short gaiters. Place Wellington and Napier in the kitchen, and Gunter and Ude in the field, and what consummate ignorance would be displayed by them all! But this term ignorance is applied with more indiscrimination than any other. A is said to be ignorant by B, because he happens not to know that which B knows, albeit he knows that of which B himself is ignorant. Tom thought the clerk at the police-office ignorant, because he professed not to know exactly how to spell "bed'cide;" he thought the magistrate ignorant; he thought the officers ignorant; indeed, the only man in ​court whom he imagined to be wise was the doctor; and yet the doctor, as will be seen, was, as far as the practices of penny-a-liners are concerned, one of the most ignorant men there!

It will be in all probability remembered that he gave one of these genuine "gentlemen of the press" two sovereigns for the suppression of Tom's evidence. Well! the doctor of course thought that it would be suppressed, and so did Tom; although he felt at the time, and strongly too, that those two sovereigns would have paid for a box of cigars, and innumerable pots of porter. The Standard, however, was no sooner in, than Tom saw the whole proceedings reported at length; and, with feelings of deep indignation, perceived that he, and he only, was ridiculed!

"A dice bad," said he, confidentially—"a very dice bad. I bust have adother idterview with you, by friedd—I bust, id fact, have that hodour id a very short tibe."

Having expressed that which he felt in these cabalistic terms, he rang the bell, and when James appeared, he said, with an air of mystery, "Jib, rud for the evedidg papers."

"The evening paper's in, sir," replied James promptly.

"What do you bead? Do you thidk I'b such a codsubbate ass as dot to kdow that the paper's id, whed I hold it id by hadd? I wadt the others the Globe, the Sud, add the Mood, if there be a Mood!"

"I shall have to go out with the carriage, sir, directly: the ladies are dressing for dinner."

"Dab the didder, Jib! Rud for the papers—bridg be the lot as sood as possible!"

James accordingly went for "the lot," and Tom again read the report in the Standard. He had previously conceived an idea that there must in reality be something peculiar in his style of pronunciation; but he had never before imagined that that peculiarity would appear so ridiculous in print. He read it aloud again and again, but as he pronounced his m's and his n's, he was really unable to detect anything wrong. The substituted b's and d's looked absurd enough, but in his ear they sounded all right.

"Bobus," said he—"Bobus. Well, that's correct! Bobus—dothidg cad be bore distidct thad Bobus! Add bed'cide. Well, bed'cide: what cad possibly be plaider thad bed'cide? I wod't have it!" he exclaimed; "it's a regular codspiracy—a dead take id!" And just as he had arrived at this conclusion, James returned with the Globe and the Sun.

"Well, Jib," he cried, "got 'eb?"

"Yes, sir. There are only two, sir, besides the one you have."

"Very well. Two are two too many. That'll do, Jib—that'll do."

James then left the room, and Tom very soon found that the reports in these papers were literally the same.

"Very good, Bister Reporter," said he, sarcastically."Very good. It strikes be I shall serve you out to-borrow! I dod't kdow exactly, add therefore I cad't say: but if I dod't get that buddy back, I'll do byself the pleasure of takidg it out. I'll see you to-borrow bordidg, you literary wretch! Here you are," he added, as the doctor entered the library—"here's the full chadge for your two sovereigds. All id!"

​"Indeed!"

"Every word of it."

"Very dishonourable: very."

"Add yet the fellow didd't like to have his hodour doubted! Why didd't you give be the buddy?"

The doctor very gravely commenced reading the report, but as he proceeded, his features relaxed, for the thing had been well done, and every point told.

"Well," said Tom, when the doctor had finished, "what do you thidk of it dow?"

"Why I think it most dishonest on the part of the reporter, but as I feel that this report will induce you to correct your defective pronunciation, I am not very sorry to see it in."

"Well, but do you bead to say, dow, seriously, that I prodoudce by ebs add eds id that ridiculous fashiod?"

"I do."

"Add are the ebs add the eds the odly letters which I prodoudce idcorrectly?"

"Your pronunciation, Tom, of every other letter in the alphabet is perfect. The substitution of the b and the d for the m and the n, alone renders your conversation comical, or, as you would say, cobical."

"Well! I'll certaidly see idto it. If this be the case, I'll sood get over those two fellows."

"I hope you now see the necessity for doing so. Your professional success, Tom, as I have before frequently explained to you, depends in a great measure upon that."

"Oh! I'll get over it. I'll sood badage it. But what are you goidg to do with that fellow?"

"The reporter?"

"Yes: of course you'll debadd the buddy back?"

"Not I! If I were to see him, I should certainly expostulate with him, for such practices are highly dishonourable; but I shall take no trouble about the matter."

"I bay get it, I suppose, if I cad?"

"If you can, Tom, you may!" replied the doctor, with a smile. "But I have an impression that you will find that there is, in that quarter, 'no money returned.'"

The impression on Tom's mind was of a different character, but he thought it inexpedient to explain how he intended to proceed: he, therefore, allowed that subject to drop; but, being anxious to have a point of far more importance settled, he said, with a countenance which denoted that anxiety, "Add dow let be ask you wud serious questiod. We all dide together at Scholefield's to-day. Very well. Dow I shall feel of course buch bore cobfortable if you tell be that you are satisfied, perfectly satisfied, that I was dot out of the house frob the tibe I left the drawidg-roob last dight till we left id the carriage together this mordidg. Are you or are you dot satisfied of this?"

"I am satisfied now, Tom—perfectly satisfied—that you are not the ​person who witnessed the robbery; but the door, Tom—the fact of the door being found open—that's the point!"

"Yes. But that poidt is berely assubed. I dod't believe a word of it! I dod't believe the door was fondd oped at all!"

"I feel justified in believing that it was; and if it were, the question is, who could have left it open if you did not? It surely could not have been Sylvester?"

"Syl! Doe: I'll adswer for hib with by life. I saw hib idto his roob; add I kdow he wedt to bed: I also kdow that if he had gode dowd stairs after that, I bust have heard hib. Besides, he isd't at all the style of fellow to do it!"

"Well, all I can say is, that it's a mystery, which time may perhaps unravel."

"But look here, father! Dod't believe that I ever have told, or that I ever will tell you a falsehood. Dod't believe it!"

"Well, Tom, I am not at all anxious to believe it. I certainly cannot prove that you ever told me a falsehood, but you are aware that these circumstances are fraught with suspicion."

"Exactly! That's the poidt! That is the very thidg which galls be! But we shall fidd it out by-add-bye."

"And, until we do find it out, Tom, I am perfectly willing to be silent on the subject."

Mrs. Delolme and Aunt Eleanor then entered the library, and shortly afterwards they, with the doctor and Tom, repaired to the house of Mr. Scholefield. Here they met the reverend gentleman, by appointment; and here Aunt Eleanor was delighted to find that Sylvester already felt perfectly at home. Of Mrs. Scholefield, he had at once become a favourite; she treated him, in fact, with as much kindness as if he had been her own son; and as she was in reality a most amiable person, Aunt Eleanor, feeling satisfied that everything would be done to promote his happiness, decided on returning to Cotherstone on the morrow.

Accordingly, in the morning, she and the reverend gentleman, accompanied by Mrs. Delolme, Mrs. Scholefield, Sylvester, and Tom, went to the office at Charing-cross, and when she had had some farther private conversation with Mrs. Scholefield, having reference to Sylvester, she left town perfectly happy in the conviction that the utmost possible care would be taken of both his morals and his health.

Immediately after the coach had started, Tom proceeded to Bowstreet alone; and, on entering the office, looked round with an anxious hope of again seeing that literary gentleman who received the two sovereigns of the doctor. That gentleman, however, was not then there; but, conceiving that he might be there anon, Tom waited two hours for him with exemplary patience, and then spoke to one of the officers of the court.

"I ab adxious," he observed, "to see a reporter."

"There they are," returned the officer, "in that there box."

"Are they reporters?"

"All on 'em."

"But I wadt to see the wud whob I saw here yesterday."

​
Tom in search of a Reporter.

​"All them was here yesterday."

"But there was wud here yesterday, who is dot here dow?"

"With all my heart!"

"Very good. But perhaps you cad tell be where to fidd hib?"

"Don't bother. How should I know where to find him?"

"Do you thidk it likely that they cad tell be?"

"Ax."

"Why, you surly, low bred, ill codditioded—"

"Silence! or I puts you out of the office!"

Tom looked at him contemptuously from head to foot and up again, and said something about his being a nice man he didn't think; but, as one of the reporters at the moment left the box, Tom turned from the fellow to address him.

"A reporter," said he, "was here yesterday whob I dod't see id the office to-day. Cad you tell be where to fidd hib?"

"What paper is he connected with?"

"He reports for seved papers, he told us."

"Seven! You are the gentleman, I believe, who was yesterday in the witness-box?"

"I ab."

"I thought so. But there was no person connected with seven papers here!"

"He certaidly told us seved."

"What was his object in speaking to you on the subject?"

"Why, he cabe to the carriage-door to idquire if we were adxious to have ady portiod of the report suppressed, add as by goverdor thought that that dodsedce bight as well be left out, the fellow offered to suppress it for two sovereigds."

"But of course you didn't give him the two sovereigns?"

"The goverdor did! He gave hib two sovereigds to leave out the lot, add thed the wretch put it all id!"

"I see," said the reporter, smiling. "But he had nothing whatever to do with it. He is not a regular reporter: he is one of those scamps who attend inquests and police-courts, expressly in order to obtain money by pretending to have the power to insert or to suppress what they please."

"The adibal!" cried Tom. "I should like to see hib dow!"

"I wish you could point him out to me. I'd have him before the magistrate at once. But he'll not be here to-day: you may depend upon that. Perhaps in a week, when he imagines that you have given him up, he may be here again."

"Thed I'll look id about this day week, add if I should see hib—"

"Point him out to me."

Tom promised that he would do so, and left the office; and, on reaching home, proceeded to explain to the doctor how completely he had been victimised.

"I've beed to Bow-street this bordidg," said he, "to look after that literary swell."

"And have you seen him?" inquired the doctor.

​"Dot a bit of it. He's idvisible. But I suppose that you are quite prepared to hear of its beidg a dead do?"

"Quite, Tom. Oh, yes: I'm quite prepared for that."

"Well, thed it wod't take you buch by surprise. But of all the swiddles that ever succeeded, that was wud of the bost perfect. Why, he's dot edgaged to report for ady paper at all! He is a fellow who frequedts the various courts, expressly id order to pick up the Greeds."

"Then, I suppose, Tom, there isn't much chance of your making two sovereigns by this transaction?"

"Dot a bit of it!"

"Well: it's a lamentable circumstance, Tom, isn't it? You see it's a dead loss to you of forty shillings."

"But, however you could have beed taked id by a dodge so disgustidgly stale, I cad't ibagide."

"Stale!" exclaimed the doctor. "It was quite fresh to me, Tom. Did you ever hear of it before?"

"I! I'b a youdg ud! I cad't be expected to kdow so buch as you. Besides, I'b a victib, add always was! I dever thought that you could be victibised!"

"All men are liable to be taken in occasionally, and when they are, Tom, the best plan is to say as little about it as possible."

"Doe doubt! But I shall say a little bore about this, if I should happed to beet that youdg gedtlebad!"

"Persuade him to return the two sovereigns, Tom."

"I dod't expect to be able to do that, but it strikes be I shall cause hib to wish that he had dever had theb!"

The doctor smiled and left the room; when Tom—who had done but very little work that week—resolved on bringing his mind to bear again upon his books, and with that view went up at once into his study.

Meanwhile, Aunt Eleanor and her reverend friend were enjoying their journey to Cotherstone Grange. It was, fortunately, a most beautiful day: there were, moreover, no other inside passengers—a circumstance which they privately deemed still more fortunate—but if even it had been wet, and the coach had been crowded, they would have been, in each other's society, happy. The journey never before appeared to be half so short to either. They were amazed at the rapidity with which they went along. They reached village after village, and town after town, as if the distance between had been scarcely a mile. The stages too appeared to be remarkably short. The horses seemed to fly from stage to stage—while Time kept pace with the horses. The reverend gentleman was never before known to have half so much to say. He had an astonishing flow of language on that occasion: in fact, he kept on continually talking from the time they left London till they reached the point at which he had directed his phaeton to be in readiness, and even then he appeared to have just as much to communicate as ever.

As they approached the Grange, new beauties seemed to have sprung up during their absence, and they felt more endeared to the place than before; and as they passed through the village they chatted so gaily, and seemed so much pleased with themselves and each other, and every​thing around them, that Obadiah Drant, who was standing with Pokey at the door of the Crumpet and Crown, so rolled his mysterious-looking head, and so tortured and twisted his inelegant body, that his friend began to think that he had had for dinner something which didn't agree with him.

"What's the matter?" inquired Pokey. "Have you got the stomach-ache?"

"The stomach-ache!" exclaimed Obadiah. "Isn't it enough to give any man the stomach-ache?" That's the dodge, is it?" he added, sarcastically. "Very good: that's it."

"What's it?" demanded Pokey.

"What's it! What! Don't your ideas fructify?"

"What do you mean?"

"What do I mean? There! That any man in the nineteenth century should be able to see the world wag as it does, without having any ideal fructification! Pokey! you're a flat. You'd never do to sit in the House of Commons! Even Bobby Peel would beat you! Why, just look you here: didn't you see Teddy pass just now with the old maid?"

"Yes. Well?"

"Well! Don't you see?"

"See what?"

"Why, the dodge!"

"What dodge?"

What dodge! Pokey, you were never born to be the Lord Chancellor. Amalgamate your ideas, man. Let 'em flow and fructify! What! Well, as true as I'm alive!—Why, just look you here: Do you mean to tell me—a man of your scope, and sense, and fructifertility—do you mean to tell me, point blank, without any reservation of ideas, that you don't see as clear as mud what Ted's been up to?"

"Can you?"

"Can I! Who can't! It's as plain as the sun at twelve o'clock. Look you here: when Harry the Eighth married Nell Gwynne, did they marry in public? No! They married privately. Now don't you see?"

"I can't say as I do," replied Pokey.

"You can't! Well, I never see such a job in my life. What! Can't you see there's been a private marriage here?"

"No, I'm blest if I can."

"Pokey, you ought to go to school again, and have them ideas of yours put under a course of fructification. Not see it! Send I may live, if I ever see such a job before! Where are your eyes? what's become of your notions? are all your ideas asleep or what, that you can't make nothing out of this?"

"Well, what do you make of it?"

"What do I make of it! Just look you here. Hasn't the old maid been up to London, and didn't Ted follow her, and haven't they been there all this time, and now haven't they come back together?"

"Well! and what of that?"

"What of it! Have you lived all these years in the world and can't see what they've been up to! They couldn't marry here. Oh! dear ​me, no: they must go up to London, and be married by special license! This is your aristocracy of humility! this is your parsonic pride! Mark my words, Pokey, that pride must come down. We're not going to let it much longer ride rough-shod over the eternal principles of the people. We must tear from their eyes what I call the film of folly. We must make them understand these amalgamating dodges. We must do as they did in France under Peter the Great, when Robespierre towelled the Dutch, we must give the aristocracy a blessed good welting. That 'll bring 'em to their senses; and mind you this, they'll never be happy till they get it. We must have a revolution all over the world; things are now on a rotten foundation: your kings, and your queens, and your bishops, and parsons, and all the lot of aristocratic leeches, who suck the best blood of the eternal people, must be swamped; they must be swept clean away from the face of the earth, as they were in the time of the Romans. What do we want with an amalgamating mass of corruption fructifying upon our very vitals? Why should we give eighty millions a-year away for nothing? What good do the aristocracy do us? If you can't pay your taxes, away go your sticks; and what for? Why, to fatten up your flaming aristocracy. Do you mean to call that eternal justice? Do you mean to call that the glorious principles of everlasting liberty? What did we sign the Magna Charta for? Why, for fructifying freedom. If we had no aristocracy, we should have no taxes; and if we had no taxes, we should be free. I'll take you then upon your Magna Charta, and show that you are nothing but slaves. Would the Russians stand it, think you? Would the Chinamen stand it? No! The Jews wouldn't stand it under Moses. Look at the history of the world, and you'll find that nobody stands it but us. When Solomon built his temple among the gods, the Solomonians wouldn't stand it: they said point blank, 'Here you've got about a thousand wives, of one sort or other, and when we come to look at the mobs of kids, we are not going to support so expensive an establishment.' Even the very workmen struck! and we must strike, and when we do strike, the blow will be a stunner. It's of no use half doing the thing: we'll go in like rattle-snakes, my boy, as they did at Nova Scotia. We'll let them see what we're made of! we'll show 'em from which point of the compass the wind blows: we'll go in a burster; and when we do, the lesson shall last 'em their lives. We'll not much longer be plundered in this way: we'll not be ground down to the earth, and have our substance squeezed out of us thus, by the iron hand of an iron-hearted aristocracy. Not a bit of it! What did Johnny Russell say in the house the other night? 'I tell the noble lord,' said he; and Johnny can speak up sometimes if he likes—'I tell the noble lord that he'd better look out. There's a spirit abroad that won't have it. It's fructifying now, and will soon break loose; and when it does, there'll be pepper.' And so there will: mind you that. Down with them!—that's my sentiments—down to the dust! A rattler, my Briton—a rattler for me. Now, just look you here———"

"Well, but what are you talking about?" inquired Pokey.

"What am I talking about?"

​"Aye! What has all this about Peter the Great, Solomon, Moses, and Magna Charta, to do with our parson? What have the Russians to do with him, or the Frenchmen, or the Chinamen?"

"What are you so thickheaded, so pugnaciously stupid, as not to see that all this tends to show you the system?"

"What system?"

"What system! Why the system of extortion—the system of plunder—the fructifying system of downright dead robbery, which grinds the people's vitals into dust."

"But we wasn't a-talking about nothing of the sort. We was talking about a private marriage."

"Well, I know it. But can't you make your ideas fructify beyond one point of the compass? I know we were talking about Teddy Rouse being privately married in London; and just look you here———"

"Well, but what makes you think so?"

"What makes me think so? Why, can there exist two opinions about it? Didn't she sneak off to London; and didn't he go sneaking after her? Why didn't he take her up with him, like a man? They have come back together because it's all over; but why not do things in a straightforward way? It's disgusting to see a man like him—a man, paid as he is for teaching simplicity—go dodging about in that manner."

"But this is all guess-work, you know."

"Guess-work! Pokey, Pokey, when shall I get you to fructify your ideas a little?"

"Yours, I think fructify a little too much. You said when he went up, that he was going after his French girl, there—what's her name—Rosalie!"

"I know I did; and what does it prove? Why, that he'll run after every one he takes a fancy to. Depend upon it, Ted's not particular. None of them are. No one expects it in a parson. They're a clerical lot; and you know what I mean by the term clerical. I say, Quocks," he added, as that gentleman joined them, "did you see Teddy Rouse and his woman come in?"

"Teddy Rouse and his woman?" said Quocks. "What do you mean? I saw him set down Mrs. Sound at the cottage."

"He didn't take her then to the parsonage-house?" observed Pokey.

"The parsonage? No. Who said he did?"

"Drant says they're married!"

"Married! Rubbish. It isn't likely!"

"Why not?" demanded Obadiah.

"Why not! Do you think he'd have taken her to the cottage, and shaken hands, and left her there, and then driven home by himself if they'd been married?"

"Well, I was only taking a charitable view of the thing; because if they're not married they ought to be, that's all about it."

"What do you mean? I shouldn't mind well thrashing any man who says there's anything a mite wrong about Mrs. Sound. She's as straight as an arrow, I'll warrant!—right up and down, and no nonsense—not a mite."

"You know she's been to London?"

​"I do: what of that?"

"You know he's been to London, too?"

"Yes, and what of that?"

"Well! Look you here: I only know it doesn't look well."

"What doesn't look well?"

"Why, it doesn't look well for Ted to run after her, and then to bring her back with him; now, does it?"

"Why not?"

"Why not! Why, it looks as if there must be something in it."

"In what?"

"Why, as Harry the Eighth said, just after the French Revolution, 'I'll tell you what it is,' said he, 'if—'"

"Never mind what Harry the Eighth said! I want to hear what you say."

"Well, but this is a case in point. 'If,' said he, 'honourable gentlemen think that I'm to be done in this way, I must fructify their intellects a little.'"

"Never mind fructifying!—give me a plain answer to a plain question."

"He never did such a thing in his life!" observed Pokey.

"Pokey," said Obadiah, gravely; "what would you have been if it hadn't been for me?"

"What do you mean?" demanded Pokey, indignantly, for he felt that he was quite as good a man as Obadiah, who never in his life had twopence that could be said to be his own; "what should I have been if it hadn't been for you?"

"Aye! what would you have been if it hadn't been for me? Look you here, now; I'll tell you: you'd have been like one of the rattlesnakes in the wilderness; you wouldn't have had a fructifying idea about you."

"Well," said Quocks, "but what have you to say against the character of Mrs. Sound?"

"What have I to say against her character?"

"Aye! You said just now that it didn't look well—that there must be something in it, and that if she were not married, she ought to be. Now, I just want to know what you mean by all this?"

"You do, do you? Well, then, just look you here: when I said that if she and Teddy Rouse were not married, they ought to be, I meant what I said, and do you mean to say they ought not?"

"But what did you mean to insinuate?"

"What did I mean to insinuate? Why, of course, that they ought to be married."

"And why?"

"Why! When Peter the Great fructified the Greeks—"

"Never mind Peter the Great: the question is, why ought they to be married?"

"I was going to tell you. Peter—"

"I wont have it. Answer my question."

"'Answer my question.' Are you one of the ragged aristocracy? Do ​
Obadiah hears his own character.

​you want to come Billy the Conqueror over us? 'Answer my question.' A fructifying tyrant could say no more to his slave. I'm the slave of no man: not a farthing's-worth of it. Come to fair argument, and I am your man. I'll go with you into the history of the world; but if you want to come any of your haughty aristocracy, it won't do for me, mind you that."

"Obadiah," said Quocks, "you're a fool. I don't flatter you when I say that you're only one remove from an idiot; because I'd much rather talk with an idiot than with you. Independently of which, an idiot—a perfect idiot—is infinitely more harmless. You take delight in stabbing the reputation of those around you: you glory in the practice of founding falsehoods upon truth: you are too vain to see that you are despised, and too ignorant even to know that you are ignorant: you are one of society's butts—a creature who has not a single friend in the world, for what man in the world can feel justified in either opening his heart to you, or trusting you with a secret?—you are a dangerous man, Obadiah—dangerous not because you have any high intellectual power, but because you are utterly destitute of it. I don't mean to I don't mean to say that you are malignant. No: you are ten times worse than a man who is actuated by malignity: you have not the tact to perceive what is calculated to injure a man, and what is not. You lose friends, Obadiah, as fast as you make them, because they soon find that you are not to be trusted."

"Well," said Obadiah, "you have been fructifying, certainly, to an amalgamating extent. Have you done?"

"Quite. My object is merely to induce you to study your own character."

"Thank you: you're very kind, you always were; but I know my own character as well as any man in Europe, Asia, Africa, or America."

"I am very sorry for it."

"No doubt. But just look you here: just allow me, if you've done now, to ask you one question. You said just now that I take a delight in stabbing the reputation of those around me. Mark you that!—those were the very words you put in juxtaposition."

"Well."

"Well, just look you here, now; whose reputation have I ever endeavoured to stab?"

"Whose reputation have you not? That's the exception, if there be one: the other's the rule."

'Well, but whose reputation have I been endeavouring to stab now?"

"That of a lady, whose goodness is known and appreciated by all but you, and that of a gentleman—for he is a gentleman—whose honour and benevolence none but you ever doubted."

"I deny it!"

"Deny what?"

"Deny what? Deny that I've been endeavouring—"

"Oh!" exclaimed Pokey, with uplifted hands; "Oh!"

"Oh! you fool: what do you mean by oh!"

"Didn't you walk in before Quocks came!"

"But I'm speaking of now! It has been said that—when I made the ​observation, that if they were not married they ought to be—I endeavoured to stab their reputation. Now, I'll prove that I endeavoured to do nothing of the sort."

"Do so."

"I'll prove it by logic, and I defy all the mathematicians in the habitable globe to knock it down. I'll prove it by the regular mathematical construction of the English language, and will any man tell me there's any constructed language in the universe more mathematically regular than that? I'll prove it in juxtaposition—"

"Well, prove it."

"Prove it! Well, just look you here, and if your ideas can fructify, let 'em. Just look at the grammatical character of the words: if they are not married, they ought to be. Isn't that a correct amalgamation?—and being amalgamated, what do the words mean? Is there any man in nature so lost to every sense of grammatical transubstantiation as not to see that they mean this, and nothing but this, that they ought to be married, if they are not?"

"But why ought they?"

"Why ought they? Isn't one a bachelor, and the other a spinster? And is there any law in life to prohibit such a marriage? What would be said if Johnny Russell, or Bobby Peel, were to bring in a bill to render marriages of that sort illegal? Wouldn't it be kicked out of the House neck and crop? I said they ought to be married; and I say so still. I'll not flinch from what I said. I'm not ashamed of what I say. I'd say it just as soon before their faces, as I would behind their backs. They ought to be married, and what objection can we have to such a marriage, if they like it? For my part, I think that they'd just suit each other."

"Ah!" exclaimed Pokey; "it won't do, you know. That's not what you meant."

"What do you mean by saying that's not what I meant? Can you tell the fructifications of my bosom? Can any man alive dive into another's heart, or see what's going on in another's private brain? It will take a wiser man than you, Pokey, to do it. I refer you to the words—if the words don't mean that, they mean nothing!"

"You shuffles," said Pokey.

"He always did shuffle," said Quocks.

"Shuffle!" exclaimed Obadiah, who was perfectly disgusted with Pokey's ingratitude. "You'd have shuffled through the world an ignoramus, if your weak ideas hadn't been fructified by me. What do you mean by shuffling?"

"Why you've shuffled in this!" returned Pokey, who wasn't aware that Obadiah had done anything to his ideas, with the exception of confusing them occasionally. "I don't care a button about the words, I look at what you meant, and you meant this—"

"We know what he meant very well," observed Quocks; "and I'd strongly recommend him, if his ideas must 'fructify' on matters of this character, to keep the 'fructification' to himself. It may be true that his slanders are not of much importance, because no one who knows him ​believes a word he utters. Were he a man with any pretensions to respectability, the consequences might be serious as well to others as to himself; but he is not: he is at best but a half-witted butt, without a particle of manly pride about him."

"You're going it!" exclaimed Obadiah. "Now I dare say you think that I care a great deal about what you say, don't you?"

"If I thought that, I would, both for your own sake and that of society, say more: I would then take some pains to show you exactly what you are; but I know that you don't care—that you haven't the sense to care: if you had, you would scorn to go prowling about as you do—picking up loose scraps of slander to 'fructify;' chuckling over the misfortunes of your neighbours; magnifying their follies, and making those follies the bases of lies. I really don't know a more contemptible character than that of a lazy—"

"Do you mean to say that I'm lazy?"

"Lazy! Why, what do you do besides lounging about barber's shops? You don't do twenty-four hours work in a week. I have nothing, of course, to do with that; but when a man has a family, and squanders away, newsmongering, three-fourths of his time, when that time might be occupied in benefiting his family, what is he but a lazy man? I should be ashamed to lead such a life."

"Oh! don't you trouble your head about me."

"I don't want to trouble my head about you. I only want to show how much better it would be if you were not to trouble your head—such a head as it is—about others. Not that I imagine that I shall be able, by showing this, to do you any good—you're past that; you must talk, and I'm not at all surprised at your talking; all that I'm surprised at is, that you should still find people to listen to your talk. You have pretty nearly tired all the old ones out: Pokey, I believe, is the only one of the lot that will listen to you now, and the sooner he sends you to Coventry, the better."

"Let him do it!" exclaimed Obadiah. "What do I care for Pokey? Who's Pokey placed in juxtaposition with me?"

Pokey, who didn't at all like this contemptuous observation, drank up his beer and departed; and as Quocks, who had already finished his, went with him, Obadiah was left there to "fructify" alone.