Whilst this was proceeding in the school-room, in the back-kitchen, or rather breakfast-parlour, immediately below, in a very brown study, there sate a very fair lady, pondering deeply over the virtues of brimstone and treacle, and the most efficacious antidote to chilblains. She was the second in command over the domestic economy of the school. Unmarried, of course. And ever and anon, as she plied the industrious needle over the heel of the too fragmental stocking, the low melody would burst unconsciously forth of, "Is there nobody coming to marry me? Nobody coming to woo-oo-oo?" Lady, not in vain was the burden of that votive song. There was somebody coming.
Let us walk upstairs —Mr. Rip is in the midst of his narrative —speaking thus:— "And, young gentlemen, as I hate presumption, and can never tolerate a coxcomb, perceiving that his lordship was going to be insolent, up went thus my foot to chastise him, and down—" A crash! a cry of alarm, and behold the chastiser of insolence, or at least, that part of him that was built of wood, through the floor!
M. Cherfeuil opening the door at this moment, and hearing a great noise, and not perceiving him who ought to have repressed it, for the boys standing round what remained of him with us, it was concealed from the worthy pedagogue, who exclaimed, "Vat a noise be here! Vere ist Mr. Reepraaptong?"
"Just stepped down below, to Miss Brocade, in the breakfast-parlour," I replied.
"Ah, bah! c'est un veritable chevalier aux dames" said M. Cherfeuil, and slamming to the door, he hurried downstairs to reclaim his too gallant representative. We allowed Mr. Riprapton to inhabit for some time two floors at once, for he was, in his position, perfectly helpless; that admired living leg of his stretched out at its length upon the floor. We soon, however, recovered him; but so much I cannot say of his composure; for he never lost it. I do not believe that he was ever discountenanced in his life.
"Nobody coming to woo-oo-oo," sang Miss Brocade, below —down into her lap come mortar, rubbish, and clouds of dust! And, when the mist clears away, there pointed down from above an inexplicable index. Her senses were bewildered; and being quite at a loss to comprehend the miracle, she had nothing else to do but faint away. When M. Cherfeuil entered, the simple and good-natured Gaul found his beloved manageress apparently lifeless at his feet, covered with the debris of his ceiling, and the wooden leg of his usher slightly tremulous above him. The fright, of course, was succeeded by a laugh, and the fracture by repairs; and the whole by the following school-boy attempt at a copy of verses, upon the never-to-be forgotten occasion:
Ambitious usher! there are fewAt once both god and man you ape
And yet you find in either shape
In showers of glittering gold;
By Jove! his Joveship was no sap;
To hope to have a like success,
Most sapient ciphering master,
And think a lady's lap to bless
With show'rs of lath and plaster?
That you should fail, when you essay'd
In striving to enchant the maid,
But when as man you wooing go,
These verses are exactly as I wrote them, and I trust the reader will not think that I could now be guilty of such a line, as "To expedite your flame," or of the pedantic school-bovism of calling a housekeeper "nymph." In fact, it is by the merest accident that I am now enabled to give them in their genuine shape. An old school-fellow, whom I have not seen since the days of syntax, and whose name I had utterly forgotten, enclosed them to me very lately.
However, such as they are, they were thought in a secluded village as something extraordinary. The usher himself affected to enjoy them extremely. They added greatly to my reputation, and what was of more consequence to me, my invitations to dinner and to tea. Truly, my half-holidays were no longer my own. I had become an object of curiosity, and I hope and believe, in many instances, of affection. I was quite cured of my mendacious propensities, by the pain, the horror, and the disgust that they had inflicted upon me at my last school. I invented no more mysteries and improbabilities for myself but my good-natured friends did it amply for me.
Mrs. Cherfeuil asserted she knew scarcely anything about me —indeed, before I came to her school, she had hardly seen me four times during the whole space of my existence. She only knew that I was the child of a lady that accident had thrown in her way, a lady whom she knew but shortly, but for whom she acquired a friendship as strong as it proved short; that, from mere sympathy she had been induced to stand godmother to me; that she had never felt authorised, nor did she inquire into the particulars of my birth. Of course, there was a mystery attached to it, but to which she had no clue; however, she knew, that at least on one side, I came of good, nay, very distinguished parentage. But this, her departed friend assured her, and that most solemnly, that whoever should stigmatise me as illegitimate, would do me a grievous wrong.
Here was a subject to be canvassed in a gossiping village! Conjecture was at its busy work. I was quite satisfied with the place that the imaginations of my hospitable patrons had given me in the social scale. Nor in the country only did I experience this friendly feeling; most of my vacations were spent in town, at the houses of the parents of some of my schoolfellows. I was now made acquainted with the scenic glories of the stage. I fought my way through crowds of fools, to see a child perform the heroic Coriolanus, the philosophical Hamlet, and the venerable and magnificent Lear. Master Betty was at the height of his reputation; and the dignified and classical Kemble had, for a time, to veil his majestic countenance from the play-going eye. Deeply infatuated, indeed, were the Mollycoddles with their Betty.
