The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures 88

The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures 88

Who is there that does not know that the Lady Patronesses of Almack's

have interdicted pantaloons, tight or loose, at their assemblies?

We have seen a MS. instruction (which, alas! never was printed)

from this mighty conclave, announcing their fiat in these words:

"_Gentlemen will not be admitted without breeches and stockings!_"

 

No sooner was this mandate, in whatever terms the published one was

couched, fulminated from King Street, than the "lean and slippered

pantaloon" was exterminated, and, as the Directresses directed,

"short hose" were the order of the day.

 

If the same lovely and honourable ladies were to take the Opera House

under their purifying control, and issue, in the same spirit at

least, an order that "Ladies will not be permitted to appear without

----" (whatever may be the proper names for the drapery of females)

we are quite convinced that they would render a great service to

society, and extricate the national character from a reproach which

the tacit endurance of such grossnesses has, in the minds of all

moderate people, unfortunately cast upon it at present.--_John Bull_,

1823.

 

 

TOLL-GATES AND THEIR KEEPERS.

 

Few persons can have passed through life, or London, without having

experienced more or less insult from the authoritative manner and

coarse language of the fellows who keep the different toll-bars round

the metropolis; but even were those persons uniformly civil and

well-behaved, the innumerable demands which they are authorised to

make, and the necessary frequency of their conversation and appeals

to the traveller, are of themselves enough to provoke the impatience

of the most placid passenger in Christendom.

 

[Illustration: AT THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS.

 

Hook, in his letter to Broderip (facsimile given elsewhere) suggests

that as they are going to Ascot races _tête-à-tête_, it might be as

well to speak of it as _neck-and-neck_. A rough sketch is enclosed of

the Zoological Gardens, Hook pointing with pride to the _necks_ of

the giraffes.]

 

We will select one line of about three or four miles, which will

answer by way of an example of what we mean: A man, driving himself

(without a servant), starts from Bishopsgate-street for Kilburn. The

day is cold and rainy--his fingers are benumbed; his two coats

buttoned up; his money in tight pantaloon-pockets; his horse restive,

apt to kick if the reins touch his tail; his gloves soaked with wet;

and himself half-an-hour too late for dinner. He has to pull up in

the middle of the street in Shoreditch, and pay a toll;--he means to

return, therefore he takes a ticket, letter A. On reaching Shoreditch

Church, he turns into the Curtain Road, pulls up again, drags off

his wet glove with his teeth, his other hand being fully occupied in

holding up the reins and the whip; pays again; gets another ticket,

number 482; drags on his glove; buttons up his coats, and rattles

away into Old Street Road; another gate; more pulling and poking, and

unbuttoning and squeezing. He pays, and takes another ticket, letter

L. The operation of getting all to rights takes place once more, nor

is it repeated until he reaches Goswell Street Road; here he performs

all the ceremonies we have already described, for a fourth time, and

gets a fourth ticket, 732, which is to clear him through the gates in

the New Road, as far as the bottom of Pentonville;--arrived there,

he performs once more all the same evolutions, and procures a fifth

ticket, letter X, which, unless some sinister accident occur, is to

carry him clear to the Paddington Road; but opening the fine space of

the Regent's Park, at the top of Portland Street, the north breeze

blowing fresh from Hampstead, bursts upon his buggy, and all the

tickets which he had received from all the gates which he has paid,

and which he had stuffed _seriatim_ between the cushion and lining

of his dennet, suddenly rise, like a covey of partridges, from the

corner, and he sees the dingy vouchers for his expenditure proceeding

down Portland Street at full speed. They are rescued, however,

muddy and filthy as they are, by the sweeper of the crossing, who

is, of course, rewarded by the driver for his attention with a

larger sum than he had originally disbursed for all the gates; and

when deposited again in the vehicle, not in their former order of

arrangement, the unfortunate traveller spends at least ten minutes

at the next gate in selecting the particular ticket which is there

required to insure his free passage.

 

Conquering all these difficulties, he reaches Paddington Gate, where

he pays afresh, and obtains a ticket, 691, with which he proceeds

swimmingly until stopped again at Kilburn, to pay a toll, which would

clear him all the way to Stanmore, if he were not going to dine at

a house three doors beyond the very turnpike, where he pays for the

seventh time, and where he obtains a seventh ticket, letter G.

 

He dines and "wines;" and the bee's-wing from the citizen's port

gives new velocity to Time. The dennet was ordered at eleven;

and, although neither tides nor the old gentleman just mentioned,

wait for any man, except Tom Hill, horses and dennets will. It is

nearer midnight than eleven when the visitor departs, even better

buttoned up than in the morning, his lamps giving cheerfulness to the

equipage, and light to the road; and his horse whisking along (his

nostrils pouring forth breath like smoke from safety-valves), and the

whole affair actually in motion at the rate of ten miles per hour.

Stopped at Paddington. "Pay here?"--"L."--"Won't do."--"G?"--(The

horse fidgety all this time, and the driver trying to read the dirty

tickets by the little light which is emitted through the _tops_ of

his lamps,)--"X?"--"It's no letter, I tell you?"--"482,"--"No." At

this juncture the clock strikes twelve--the driver is told that

his reading and rummaging are alike useless, for that a new day

has begun. The coats are, therefore, unbuttoned--the gloves pulled

off--the money to be fished out--the driver discovers that his last

shilling was paid to the ostler at the inn where his horse was fed

and that he must change a sovereign to pay the gate. This operation

the toll-keeper performs; nor does the driver discover, until the

morning, that one of the half-crowns and four of the shillings which

he has received, are bad. Satisfied, however, with what has occurred,

he determines at all hazards to drive home over the stones,

and avoid all further importunities from the turnpike-keepers.

Accordingly, away he goes along Oxford Street, over the pavement,

working into one hole and tumbling into another, like a ball on a

_trou madame_ table, until, at the end of George Street, St. Giles's,

snap goes his axle-tree; away goes his horse, dashing the dennet

against a post at the corner of Plumtree Street, leaving the driver,

with his collar-bone and left arm broken, on the pavement, at the

mercy of two or three popish bricklayers and a couple of women of the

town, who humanely lift him to the coach-stand, and deposit him in

a hackney-chariot, having previously cut off the skirts of both his

coats, and relieved him, not only of his loose change, but of a gold

repeater, a snuff-box, and a pocket-book full of notes and memoranda,

of no use but to the owner.

 

The unhappy victim at length reaches home, in agonies from the

continued roughness of the pre-adamite pavement, is put to

bed--doctors are sent for, the fractures are reduced, and in seven

weeks he is able to crawl into his counting-house to write a cheque

for a new dennet, and give his people orders to shoot his valuable

horse, who has so dreadfully injured himself on the fatal night as to

be past recovery.

 

 

TOM SHERIDAN'S ADVENTURE.[66]

 

Tom Sheridan was staying at Lord Craven's at Benham (or rather

Hampstead), and one day proceeded on a shooting excursion, like

Hawthorn, with only "his dog and his gun," on foot, and unattended by

companion or keeper; the sport was bad--the birds few and shy--and he

walked and walked in search of game, until, unconsciously, he entered

the domain of some neighbouring squire.

 

A very short time after, he perceived advancing towards him, at the

top of his speed, a jolly, comfortable-looking gentleman, followed

by a servant, armed, as it appeared, for conflict. Tom took up a

position, and waited the approach of the enemy.

 

"Hallo! you sir," said the squire, when within half-earshot, "what

are you doing here, sir, eh?"

 

"I'm shooting, sir," said Tom.

 

"Do you know where you are, sir?" said the squire.

 

"I'm here, sir," said Tom.

 

"Here, sir," said the squire, growing angry; "and do you know where

here _is_, sir? These, sir, are _my_ manors; what d'ye think of that,

sir, eh?"

 

"Why, sir, as to your manners," said Tom, "I can't say they seem over

agreeable."

 

"I don't want any jokes, sir," said the squire, "I hate jokes. Who

are you, sir?--what are you?"

 

"Why, sir," said Tom, "my name is Sheridan--I am staying at Lord

Craven's--I have come out for some sport--I have not had any, and I

am not aware that I am trespassing."

 

"Sheridan!" said the squire, cooling a little; "oh, from Lord

Craven's, eh? Well, sir, I could not know _that_, sir--I----'

 

"No, sir," said Tom, "but you need not have been in a passion."

 

"Not in a passion! Mr. Sheridan," said the squire, "you don't know,

sir, what these preserves have cost me, and the pains and trouble I

have been at with them; it's all very well for _you_ to talk, but if

you were in _my_ place I should like to know what _you_ would say

upon such an occasion."

 

"Why, sir," said Tom, "if I were in _your_ place, under all the

circumstances, I should say--'I am convinced, Mr. Sheridan, you did

not mean to annoy me; and, as you look a good deal tired, perhaps

you'll come up to my house and take some refreshment?'"

 

The squire was hit hard by this nonchalance, and (as the newspapers

say), "it is needless to add," acted upon Sheridan's suggestion.

 

"So far," said poor Tom, "the story tells for me,--now you shall hear

the sequel."

 

After having regaled himself at the squire's house, and having said

five hundred more good things than he swallowed; having delighted his

host, and more than half won the hearts of his wife and daughters,

the sportsman proceeded on his return homewards.

 

In the course of his walk he passed through a farm-yard; in the front

of the farm-house was a green, in the centre of which was a pond, in

the pond were ducks innumerable swimming and diving; on its verdant

banks a motley group of gallant cocks and pert partlets, picking and

feeding--the farmer was leaning over the hatch of the barn, which stood near two cottages on the side of the green.