Burlesques: Novels by Eminent Hands Read online

caught eagerly at Tagrag's suggestion, and went down to Tuggeridgeville. If we

  had a difficulty to find friends in town, here there was none: for the whole

  county came about us, ate our dinners and suppers, danced at our balls�ay, and

  spoke to us too. We were great people in fact: I a regular country gentleman;

  and as such, Jemmy insisted that I should be a sportsman, and join the county

  hunt. "But," says I, "my love, I can't ride." "Pooh! Mr. C." said she, "you're

  always making difficulties: you thought you couldn't dance a quadrille; you

  thought you couldn't dine at seven o'clock; you thought you couldn't lie in bed

  after six; and haven't you done every one of these things? You must and you

  shall ride!" And when my Jemmy said "must and shall," I knew very well there was

  nothing for it: so I sent down fifty guineas to the hunt, and, out of compliment

  to me, the very next week, I received notice that the meet of the hounds would

  take place at Squashtail Common, just outside my lodge-gates.

  I didn't know what a meet was; and me and Mrs. C. agreed that it was most

  probable the dogs were to be fed there. However, Tagrag explained this matter to

  us, and very kindly promised to sell me a horse, a delightful animal of his own;

  which, being desperately pressed for money, he would let me have for a hundred

  guineas, he himself having given a hundred and fifty for it.

  Well, the Thursday came: the hounds met on Squashtail Common; Mrs. C. turned out

  in her barouche to see us throw off; and, being helped up on my chestnut horse,

  Trumpeter, by Tagrag and my head groom, I came presently round to join them.

  Tag mounted his own horse; and, as we walked down the avenue, "I thought," he

  said, "you told me you knew how to ride; and that you had ridden once fifty

  miles on a stretch!"

  "And so I did," says I, "to Cambridge, and on the box too."

  "ON THE BOX!" says he; "but did you ever mount a horse before?"

  "Never," says I, "but I find it mighty easy."

  "Well," says he, "you're mighty bold for a barber; and I like you, Coxe, for

  your spirit." And so we came out of the gate.

  As for describing the hunt, I own, fairly, I can't. I've been at a hunt, but

  what a hunt is�why the horses WILL go among the dogs and ride them down�why the

  men cry out "yooooic"�why the dogs go snuffing about in threes and fours, and

  the huntsman says, "Good Towler�good Betsy," and we all of us after him say,

  "Good Towler� good Betsy" in course: then, after hearing a yelp here and a howl

  there, tow, row, yow, yow, yow! burst out, all of a sudden, from three or four

  of them, and the chap in a velvet cap screeches out (with a number of oaths I

  shan't repeat here), "Hark, to Ringwood!" and then, "There he goes!" says some

  one; and all of a sudden, helter skelter, skurry hurry, slap bang, whooping,

  screeching and hurraing, blue-coats and red-coats, bays and grays, horses, dogs,

  donkeys, butchers, baro-knights, dustmen, and blackguard boys, go tearing all

  together over the common after two or three of the pack that yowl loudest. Why

  all this is, I can't say; but it all took place the second Thursday of last

  March, in my presence.

  Up to this, I'd kept my seat as well as the best, for we'd only been trotting

  gently about the field until the dogs found; and I managed to stick on very

  well; but directly the tow-rowing began, off went Trumpeter like a thunderbolt,

  and I found myself playing among the dogs like the donkey among the chickens.

  "Back, Mr. Coxe," holloas the huntsman; and so I pulled very hard, and cried

  out, Wo!" but he wouldn't; and on I went galloping for the dear life. How I kept

  on is a wonder; but I squeezed my knees in very tight, and shoved my feet very

  hard into the stirrups, and kept stiff hold of the scruff of Trumpeter's neck,

  and looked betwixt his ears as well as ever I could, and trusted to luck: for I

  was in a mortal fright, sure enough, as many a better man would be in such a

  case, let alone a poor hairdresser.

  As for the hounds, after my first riding in among them, I tell you honestly, I

  never saw so much as the tip of one of their tails; nothing in this world did I

  see except Trumpeter's dun-colored mane, and that I gripped firm: riding, by the

  blessing of luck, safe through the walking, the trotting, the galloping, and

  never so much as getting a tumble.

  There was a chap at Croydon very well known as the "Spicy Dustman," who, when he

  could get no horse to ride to the hounds, turned regularly out on his donkey;

  and on this occasion made one of us. He generally managed to keep up with the

  dogs by trotting quietly through the cross-roads, and knowing the country well.

  Well, having a good guess where the hounds would find, and the line that sly

  Reynolds (as they call the fox) would take, the Spicy Dustman turned his animal

  down the lane from Squashtail to Cutshins Common; across which, sure enough,

  came the whole hunt. There's a small hedge and a remarkably fine ditch here:

  some of the leading chaps took both, in gallant style; others went round by a

  gate, and so would I, only I couldn't; for Trumpeter would have the hedge, and

  be hanged to him, and went right for it.

  Hoop! if ever you DID try a leap! Out go your legs, out fling your arms, off

  goes your hat; and the next thing you feel�that is, I did�is a most tremendous

  thwack across the chest, and my feet jerked out of the stirrups: me left in the

  branches of a tree; Trumpeter gone clean from under me, and walloping and

  floundering in the ditch underneath. One of the stirrup-leathers had caught in a

  stake, and the horse couldn't get away: and neither of us, I thought, ever WOULD

  have got away: but all of a sudden, who should come up the lane but the Spicy

  Dustman!

  "Holloa!" says I, "you gent, just let us down from this here tree!"

  "Lor'!" says he, "I'm blest if I didn't take you for a robin."

  "Let's down," says I; but he was all the time employed in disengaging Trumpeter,

  whom he got out of the ditch, trembling and as quiet as possible. "Let's down,"

  says I. "Presently," says he; and taking off his coat, he begins whistling and

  swishing down Trumpeter's sides and saddle; and when he had finished, what do

  you think the rascal did?�he just quietly mounted on Trumpeter's back, and

  shouts out, "Git down yourself, old Bearsgrease; you've only to drop! I'LL give

  your 'oss a hairing arter them 'ounds; and you�vy, you may ride back my pony to

  Tuggeridgeweal!" And with this, I'm blest if he didn't ride away, leaving me

  holding, as for the dear life, and expecting every minute the branch would

  break.

  It DID break too, and down I came into the slush; and when I got out of it, I

  can tell you I didn't look much like the Venuses or the Apollor Belvidearis what

  I used to dress and titivate up for my shop window when I was in the

  hairdressing line, or smell quite so elegant as our rose-oil. Faugh! what a

  figure I was!

  I had nothing for it but to mount the dustman's donkey (which was very quietly

  cropping grass in the hedge), and to make my way home; and after a weary, weary

  journey, I arrived at my own gate.

 
; A whole party was assembled there. Tagrag, who had come back; their Excellencies

  Mace and Punter, who were on a visit; and a number of horses walking up and down

  before the whole of the gentlemen of the hunt, who had come in after losing

  their fox! "Here's Squire Coxe!" shouted the grooms. Out rushed the servants,

  out poured the gents of the hunt, and on trotted poor me, digging into the

  donkey, and everybody dying with laughter at me.

  Just as I got up to the door, a horse came galloping up, and passed me; a man

  jumped down, and taking off a fantail hat, came up, very gravely, to help me

  down.

  "Squire," says he, "how came you by that there hanimal? Jist git down, will you,

  and give it to its howner?"

  "Rascal!" says I, "didn't you ride off on my horse?"

  "Was there ever sich ingratitude?" says the Spicy. "I found this year 'oss in a

  pond, I saves him from drowning, I brings him back to his master, and he calls

  me a rascal!"

  The grooms, the gents, the ladies in the balcony, my own servants, all set up a

  roar at this; and so would I, only I was so deucedly ashamed, as not to be able

  to laugh just then.

  And so my first day's hunting ended. Tagrag and the rest declared I showed great

  pluck, and wanted me to try again; but "No," says I, "I HAVE been."

  THE FINISHING TOUCH.

  I was always fond of billiards: and, in former days, at Grogram's in Greek

  Street, where a few jolly lads of my acquaintance used to meet twice a week for

  a game, and a snug pipe and beer, I was generally voted the first man of the

  club; and could take five from John the marker himself. I had a genius, in fact,

  for the game; and now that I was placed in that station of life where I could

  cultivate my talents, I gave them full play, and improved amazingly. I do say

  that I think myself as good a hand as any chap in England.

  The Count and his Excellency Baron von Punter were, I can tell you, astonished

  by the smartness of my play: the first two or three rubbers Punter beat me, but

  when I came to know his game, I used to knock him all to sticks; or, at least,

  win six games to his four: and such was the betting upon me; his Excellency

  losing large sums to the Count, who knew what play was, and used to back me. I

  did not play except for shillings, so my skill was of no great service to me.

  One day I entered the billiard-room where these three gentlemen were high in

  words. "The thing shall not be done," I heard Captain Tagrag say: "I won't stand

  it."

  "Vat, begause you would have de bird all to yourzelf, hey?" said the Baron.

  "You sall not have a single fezare of him, begar," said the Count: "ve vill blow

  you, M. de Taguerague; parole d'honneur, ve vill."

  "What's all this, gents," says I, stepping in, "about birds and feathers?"

  "Oh," says Tagrag, "we were talking about�about�pigeon-shooting; the Count here

  says he will blow a bird all to pieces at twenty yards, and I said I wouldn't

  stand it, because it was regular murder."

  "Oh, yase, it was bidgeon-shooting," cries the Baron: "and I know no better

  sbort. Have you been bidgeon-shooting, my dear Squire? De fon is gabidal."

  "No doubt," says I, "for the shooters, but mighty bad sport for the PIGEON." And

  this joke set them all a-laughing ready to die. I didn't know then what a good

  joke it WAS, neither; but I gave Master Baron, that day, a precious good

  beating, and walked off with no less than fifteen shillings of his money.

  As a sporting man, and a man of fashion, I need not say that I took in the

  Flare-up regularly; ay, and wrote one or two trifles in that celebrated

  publication (one of my papers, which Tagrag subscribed for me,

  Philo-pestitiaeamicus, on the proper sauce for teal and widgeon�and the other,

  signed Scru-tatos, on the best means of cultivating the kidney species of that

  vegetable�made no small noise at the time, and got me in the paper a compliment

  from the editor). I was a constant reader of the Notices to Correspondents, and,

  my early education having been rayther neglected (for I was taken from my

  studies and set, as is the custom in our trade, to practise on a sheep's head at

  the tender age of nine years, before I was allowed to venture on the humane

  countenance,)�I say, being thus curtailed and cut off in my classical learning,

  I must confess I managed to pick up a pretty smattering of genteel information

  from that treasury of all sorts of knowledge; at least sufficient to make me a

  match in learning for all the noblemen and gentlemen who came to our house.

  Well, on looking over the Flare-up notices to correspondents, I read, one day

  last April, among the notices, as follows:�

  "'Automodon.' We do not know the precise age of Mr. Baker of Covent Garden

  Theatre; nor are we aware if that celebrated son of Thespis is a married man.

  "'Ducks and Green-peas' is informed, that when A plays his rook to B's second

  Knight's square, and B, moving two squares with his Queen's pawn, gives check to

  his adversary's Queen, there is no reason why B's Queen should not take A's

  pawn, if B be so inclined.

  "'F. L. S.' We have repeatedly answered the question about Madame Vestris: her

  maiden name was Bartolozzi, and she married the son of Charles Mathews, the

  celebrated comedian.

  "'Fair Play.' The best amateur billiard and ecarte player in England, is Coxe

  Tuggeridge Coxe, Esq., of Portland Place, and Tuggeridgeville: Jonathan, who

  knows his play, can only give him two in a game of a hundred; and, at the cards,

  NO man is his superior. Verbum sap.

  "'Scipio Americanus' is a blockhead."

  I read this out to the Count and Tagrag, and both of them wondered how the

  Editor of that tremendous Flare-up should get such information; and both agreed

  that the Baron, who still piqued himself absurdly on his play, would be vastly

  annoyed by seeing me preferred thus to himself. We read him the paragraph, and

  preciously angry he was. "Id is," he cried, "the tables" (or "de DABELS," as he

  called them),�"de horrid dabels; gom viz me to London, and dry a slate-table,

  and I vill beat you." We all roared at this; and the end of the dispute was,

  that, just to satisfy the fellow, I agreed to play his Excellency at

  slate-tables, or any tables he chose.

  "Gut," says he, "gut; I lif, you know, at Abednego's, in de Quadrant; his dabels

  is goot; ve vill blay dere, if you vill." And I said I would: and it was agreed

  that, one Saturday night, when Jemmy was at the Opera, we should go to the

  Baron's rooms, and give him a chance.

  We went, and the little Baron had as fine a supper as ever I saw: lots of

  Champang (and I didn't mind drinking it), and plenty of laughing and fun.

  Afterwards, down we went to billiards. "Is dish Misther Coxsh, de shelebrated

  player?" says Mr. Abednego, who was in the room, with one or two gentlemen of

  his own persuasion, and several foreign noblemen, dirty, snuffy, and hairy, as

  them foreigners are. "Is dish Misther Coxsh? blesh my hart, it is a honor to see

  you; I have heard so much of your play."

  "Come, come," says I, "sir"�for I'm pretty wide awake�"none of your gammon; />
  you're not going to book ME."

  "No, begar, dis fish you not catch," says Count Mace.

  "Dat is gut!�haw! haw!" snorted the Baron. "Hook him! Lieber Himmel, you might

  dry and hook me as well. Haw! haw!"

  Well, we went to play. "Five to four on Coxe," screams out the Count.�"Done and

  done," says another nobleman. "Ponays," says the Count.�"Done," says the

  nobleman. "I vill take your six crowns to four," says the Baron.�"Done," says I.

  And, in the twinkling of an eye, I beat him once making thirteen off the balls

  without stopping.

  We had some more wine after this; and if you could have seen the long faces of

  the other noblemen, as they pulled out their pencils and wrote I.O.U.'s for the

  Count! "Va toujours, mon cher," says he to me, "you have von for me three

  hundred pounds."

  "I'll blay you guineas dis time," says the Baron. "Zeven to four you must give

  me though." And so I did: and in ten minutes THAT game was won, and the Baron

  handed over his pounds. "Two hundred and sixty more, my dear, dear Coxe," says

  the Count: "you are mon ange gardien!" "Wot a flat Misther Coxsh is, not to back

  his luck," I hoard Abednego whisper to one of the foreign noblemen.

  "I'll take your seven to four, in tens," said I to the Baron. "Give me three,"

  says he, "and done." I gave him three, and lost the game by one. "Dobbel, or

  quits," says he. "Go it," says I, up to my mettle: "Sam Coxe never says no;" and

  to it we went. I went in, and scored eighteen to his five. "Holy Moshesh!" says

  Abednego, "dat little Coxsh is a vonder! who'll take odds?"

  "I'll give twenty to one," says I, "in guineas."

  "Ponays; yase, done," screams out the Count.

  "BONIES, done," roars out the Baron: and, before I could speak, went in,

  and�would you believe it?�in two minutes he somehow made the game!

  . . . . . .

  Oh, what a figure I cut when my dear Jemmy heard of this afterwards! In vain I

  swore it was guineas: the Count and the Baron swore to ponies; and when I

  refused, they both said their honor was concerned, and they must have my life,

  or their money. So when the Count showed me actually that, in spite of this bet

  (which had been too good to resist) won from me, he had been a very heavy loser

  by the night; and brought me the word of honor of Abednego, his Jewish friend,

  and the foreign noblemen, that ponies had been betted;�why, I paid them one

  thousand pounds sterling of good and lawful money.�But I've not played for money

  since: no, no; catch me at THAT again if you can.

  A NEW DROP-SCENE AT THE OPERA.

  No lady is a lady without having a box at the Opera: so my Jemmy, who knew as

  much about music,�bless her!�as I do about Sanscrit, algebra, or any other

  foreign language, took a prime box on the second tier. It was what they called a

  double box; it really COULD hold two, that is, very comfortably; and we got it a

  great bargain� for five hundred a year! Here, Tuesdays and Saturdays, we used

  regularly to take our places, Jemmy and Jemimarann sitting in front; me, behind:

  but as my dear wife used to wear a large fantail gauze hat with ostrich

  feathers, birds-of-paradise, artificial flowers, and tags of muslin or satin,

  scattered all over it, I'm blest if she didn't fill the whole of the front of

  the box; and it was only by jumping and dodging, three or four times in the

  course of the night, that I could manage to get a sight of the actors. By

  kneeling down, and looking steady under my darling Jemmy's sleeve, I DID

  contrive, every now and then, to have a peep of Senior Lablash's boots, in the

  "Puritanny," and once actually saw Madame Greasi's crown and head-dress in

  "Annybalony."

  What a place that Opera is, to be sure! and what enjoyments us aristocracy used

  to have! Just as you have swallowed down your three courses (three curses I used

  to call them;�for so, indeed, they are, causing a deal of heartburns, headaches,

  doctor's bills, pills, want of sleep, and such like)�just, I say, as you get

  down your three courses, which I defy any man to enjoy properly unless he has