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Story
At one period of its reverses, the House fell into the occupation of
a Showman. He was found registered as its occupier, on the parish
books of the time when he rented the House, and there was therefore
no need of any clue to his name. But, he himself was less easy to
be found; for, he had led a wandering life, and settled people had
lost sight of him, and people who plumed themselves on being
respectable were shy of admitting that they had ever known anything
of him. At last, among the marsh lands near the river's level, that
lie about Deptford and the neighbouring market-gardens, a Grizzled
Personage in velveteen, with a face so cut up by varieties of
weather that he looked as if he had been tattooed, was found smoking
a pipe at the door of a wooden house on wheels. The wooden house
was laid up in ordinary for the winter, near the mouth of a muddy
creek; and everything near it, the foggy river, the misty marshes,
and the steaming market-gardens, smoked in company with the grizzled
man. In the midst of this smoking party, the funnel-chimney of the
wooden house on wheels was not remiss, but took its pipe with the
rest in a companionable manner.
On being asked if it were he who had once rented the House to Let,
Grizzled Velveteen looked surprised, and said yes. Then his name
was Magsman? That was it, Toby Magsman--which lawfully christened
Robert; but called in the line, from a infant, Toby. There was
nothing agin Toby Magsman, he believed? If there was suspicion of
such--mention it!
There was no suspicion of such, he might rest assured. But, some
inquiries were making about that House, and would he object to say
why he left it?
Not at all; why should he? He left it, along of a Dwarf.
Along of a Dwarf?
Mr. Magsman repeated, deliberately and emphatically, Along of a
Dwarf.
Might it be compatible with Mr. Magsman's inclination and
convenience to enter, as a favour, into a few particulars?
Mr. Magsman entered into the following particulars.
It was a long time ago, to begin with;--afore lotteries and a deal
more was done away with. Mr. Magsman was looking about for a good
pitch, and he see that house, and he says to himself, "I'll have
you, if you're to be had. If money'll get you, I'll have you."
The neighbours cut up rough, and made complaints; but Mr. Magsman
don't know what they WOULD have had. It was a lovely thing. First
of all, there was the canvass, representin the picter of the Giant,
in Spanish trunks and a ruff, who was himself half the heighth of
the house, and was run up with a line and pulley to a pole on the
roof, so that his Ed was coeval with the parapet. Then, there was
the canvass, representin the picter of the Albina lady, showing her
white air to the Army and Navy in correct uniform. Then, there was
the canvass, representin the picter of the Wild Indian a scalpin a
member of some foreign nation. Then, there was the canvass,
representin the picter of a child of a British Planter, seized by
two Boa Constrictors--not that WE never had no child, nor no
Constrictors neither. Similarly, there was the canvass, representin
the picter of the Wild Ass of the Prairies--not that WE never had no
wild asses, nor wouldn't have had 'em at a gift. Last, there was
the canvass, representin the picter of the Dwarf, and like him too
(considerin), with George the Fourth in such a state of astonishment
at him as His Majesty couldn't with his utmost politeness and
stoutness express. The front of the House was so covered with
canvasses, that there wasn't a spark of daylight ever visible on
that side. "MAGSMAN'S AMUSEMENTS," fifteen foot long by two foot
high, ran over the front door and parlour winders. The passage was
a Arbour of green baize and gardenstuff. A barrel-organ performed
there unceasing. And as to respectability,--if threepence ain't
respectable, what is?
But, the Dwarf is the principal article at present, and he was worth
the money. He was wrote up as MAJOR TPSCHOFFKI, OF THE IMPERIAL
BULGRADERIAN BRIGADE. Nobody couldn't pronounce the name, and it
never was intended anybody should. The public always turned it, as
a regular rule, into Chopski. In the line he was called Chops;
partly on that account, and partly because his real name, if he ever
had any real name (which was very dubious), was Stakes.
He was a un-common small man, he really was. Certainly not so small
as he was made out to be, but where IS your Dwarf as is? He was a
most uncommon small man, with a most uncommon large Ed; and what he
had inside that Ed, nobody ever knowed but himself: even supposin
himself to have ever took stock of it, which it would have been a
stiff job for even him to do.
The kindest little man as never growed! Spirited, but not proud.
When he travelled with the Spotted Baby--though he knowed himself to
be a nat'ral Dwarf, and knowed the Baby's spots to be put upon him
artificial, he nursed that Baby like a mother. You never heerd him
give a ill-name to a Giant. He DID allow himself to break out into
strong language respectin the Fat Lady from Norfolk; but that was an
affair of the 'art; and when a man's 'art has been trifled with by a
lady, and the preference giv to a Indian, he ain't master of his
actions.
He was always in love, of course; every human nat'ral phenomenon is.
And he was always in love with a large woman; I never knowed the
Dwarf as could be got to love a small one. Which helps to keep 'em
the Curiosities they are.
One sing'ler idea he had in that Ed of his, which must have meant
something, or it wouldn't have been there. It was always his
opinion that he was entitled to property. He never would put his
name to anything. He had been taught to write, by the young man
without arms, who got his living with his toes (quite a writing
master HE was, and taught scores in the line), but Chops would have
starved to death, afore he'd have gained a bit of bread by putting
his hand to a paper. This is the more curious to bear in mind,
because HE had no property, nor hope of property, except his house
and a sarser. When I say his house, I mean the box, painted and got
up outside like a reg'lar six-roomer, that he used to creep into,
with a diamond ring (or quite as good to look at) on his forefinger,
and ring a little bell out of what the Public believed to be the
Drawing-room winder. And when I say a sarser, I mean a Chaney
sarser in which he made a collection for himself at the end of every
Entertainment. His cue for that, he took from me: "Ladies and
gentlemen, the little man will now walk three times round the
Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain." When he said anything
important, in private life, he mostly wound it up with this form of
words, and they was generally the last thing he said to me at night
afore he went to bed.
He had what I consider a fine mind--a poetic mind. His ideas
respectin his property never come upon him so strong as when he sat
upon a barrel-organ and had the handle turned. Arter the wibration
had run through him a little time, he would screech out, "Toby, I
feel my property coming--grind away! I'm counting my guineas by
thousands, Toby--grind away! Toby, I shall be a man of fortun! I
feel the Mint a jingling in me, Toby, and I'm swelling out into the
Bank of England!" Such is the influence of music on a poetic mind.
Not that he was partial to any other music but a barrel-organ; on
the contrary, hated it.
He had a kind of a everlasting grudge agin the Public: which is a
thing you may notice in many phenomenons that get their living out
of it. What riled him most in the nater of his occupation was, that
it kep him out of Society. He was continiwally saying, "Toby, my
ambition is, to go into Society. The curse of my position towards
the Public is, that it keeps me hout of Society. This don't signify
to a low beast of a Indian; he an't formed for Society. This don't
signify to a Spotted Baby; HE an't formed for Society.--I am."
Nobody never could make out what Chops done with his money. He had
a good salary, down on the drum every Saturday as the day came
round, besides having the run of his teeth--and he was a Woodpecker
to eat--but all Dwarfs are. The sarser was a little income,
bringing him in so many halfpence that he'd carry 'em for a week
together, tied up in a pocket-handkercher. And yet he never had
money. And it couldn't be the Fat Lady from Norfolk, as was once
supposed; because it stands to reason that when you have a animosity
towards a Indian, which makes you grind your teeth at him to his
face, and which can hardly hold you from Goosing him audible when
he's going through his War-Dance--it stands to reason you wouldn't
under them circumstances deprive yourself, to support that Indian in
the lap of luxury.
Most unexpected, the mystery come out one day at Egham Races. The
Public was shy of bein pulled in, and Chops was ringin his little
bell out of his drawing-room winder, and was snarlin to me over his
shoulder as he kneeled down with his legs out at the back-door--for
he couldn't be shoved into his house without kneeling down, and the
premises wouldn't accommodate his legs--was snarlin, "Here's a
precious Public for you; why the Devil don't they tumble up?" when a
man in the crowd holds up a carrier-pigeon, and cries out, "If
there's any person here as has got a ticket, the Lottery's just
drawed, and the number as has come up for the great prize is three,
seven, forty-two! Three, seven, forty-two!" I was givin the man to
the Furies myself, for calling off the Public's attention--for the
Public will turn away, at any time, to look at anything in
preference to the thing showed 'em; and if you doubt it, get 'em
together for any indiwidual purpose on the face of the earth, and
send only two people in late, and see if the whole company an't far
more interested in takin particular notice of them two than of you--
I say, I wasn't best pleased with the man for callin out, and wasn't
blessin him in my own mind, when I see Chops's little bell fly out
of winder at a old lady, and he gets up and kicks his box over,
exposin the whole secret, and he catches hold of the calves of my
legs and he says to me, "Carry me into the wan, Toby, and throw a
pail of water over me or I'm a dead man, for I've come into my
property!"
Twelve thousand odd hundred pound, was Chops's winnins. He had
bought a half-ticket for the twenty-five thousand prize, and it had
come up. The first use he made of his property, was, to offer to
fight the Wild Indian for five hundred pound a side, him with a
poisoned darnin-needle and the Indian with a club; but the Indian
being in want of backers to that amount, it went no further.
Arter he had been mad for a week--in a state of mind, in short, in
which, if I had let him sit on the organ for only two minutes, I
believe he would have bust--but we kep the organ from him--Mr. Chops
come round, and behaved liberal and beautiful to all. He then sent
for a young man he knowed, as had a wery genteel appearance and was
a Bonnet at a gaming-booth (most respectable brought up, father
havin been imminent in the livery stable line but unfort'nate in a
commercial crisis, through paintin a old gray, ginger-bay, and
sellin him with a Pedigree), and Mr. Chops said to this Bonnet, who
said his name was Normandy, which it wasn't:
"Normandy, I'm a goin into Society. Will you go with me?"
Says Normandy: "Do I understand you, Mr. Chops, to hintimate that
the 'ole of the expenses of that move will be borne by yourself?"
"Correct," says Mr. Chops. "And you shall have a Princely allowance
too."
The Bonnet lifted Mr. Chops upon a chair, to shake hands with him,
and replied in poetry, with his eyes seemingly full of tears:
"My boat is on the shore,
And my bark is on the sea,
And I do not ask for more,
But I'll Go:- along with thee."
They went into Society, in a chay and four grays with silk jackets.
They took lodgings in Pall Mall, London, and they blazed away.
In consequence of a note that was brought to Bartlemy Fair in the
autumn of next year by a servant, most wonderful got up in milk-
white cords and tops, I cleaned myself and went to Pall Mall, one
evening appinted. The gentlemen was at their wine arter dinner, and
Mr. Chops's eyes was more fixed in that Ed of his than I thought
good for him. There was three of 'em (in company, I mean), and I
knowed the third well. When last met, he had on a white Roman
shirt, and a bishop's mitre covered with leopard-skin, and played
the clarionet all wrong, in a band at a Wild Beast Show.
This gent took on not to know me, and Mr. Chops said: "Gentlemen,
this is a old friend of former days:" and Normandy looked at me
through a eye-glass, and said, "Magsman, glad to see you!"--which
I'll take my oath he wasn't. Mr. Chops, to git him convenient to
the table, had his chair on a throne (much of the form of George the
Fourth's in the canvass), but he hardly appeared to me to be King
there in any other pint of view, for his two gentlemen ordered about
like Emperors. They was all dressed like May-Day--gorgeous!--And as
to Wine, they swam in all sorts.
I made the round of the bottles, first separate (to say I had done
it), and then mixed 'em all together (to say I had done it), and
then tried two of 'em as half-and-half, and then t'other two.
Altogether, I passed a pleasin evenin, but with a tendency to feel
muddled, until I considered it good manners to get up and say, "Mr.
Chops, the best of friends must part, I thank you for the wariety of
foreign drains you have stood so 'ansome, I looks towards you in red
wine, and I takes my leave." Mr. Chops replied, "If you'll just
hitch me out of this over your right arm, Magsman, and carry me
down-stairs, I'll see you out." I said I couldn't think of such a
thing, but he would have it, so I lifted him off his throne. He
smelt strong of Maideary, and I couldn't help thinking as I carried
him down that it was like carrying a large bottle full of wine, with
a rayther ugly stopper, a good deal out of proportion.
When I set him on the door-mat in the hall, he kep me close to him
by holding on to my coat-collar, and he whispers:
"I ain't 'appy, Magsman."
"What's on your mind, Mr. Chops?"
"They don't use me well. They an't grateful to me. They puts me on
the mantel-piece when I won't have in more Champagne-wine, and they
locks me in the sideboard when I won't give up my property."
"Get rid of 'em, Mr. Chops."
"I can't. We're in Society together, and what would Society say?"
"Come out of Society!" says I.
"I can't. You don't know what you're talking about. When you have
once gone into Society, you mustn't come out of it."
"Then if you'll excuse the freedom, Mr. Chops," were my remark,
shaking my head grave, "I think it's a pity you ever went in."
Mr. Chops shook that deep Ed of his, to a surprisin extent, and
slapped it half a dozen times with his hand, and with more Wice than
I thought were in him. Then, he says, "You're a good fellow, but
you don't understand. Good-night, go along. Magsman, the little
man will now walk three times round the Cairawan, and retire behind
the curtain." The last I see of him on that occasion was his tryin,
on the extremest werge of insensibility, to climb up the stairs, one
by one, with his hands and knees. They'd have been much too steep
for him, if he had been sober; but he wouldn't be helped.
It warn't long after that, that I read in the newspaper of Mr.
Chops's being presented at court. It was printed, "It will be
recollected"--and I've noticed in my life, that it is sure to be
printed that it WILL be recollected, whenever it won't--"that Mr.
Chops is the individual of small stature, whose brilliant success in
the last State Lottery attracted so much attention." Well, I says
to myself, Such is Life! He has been and done it in earnest at
last. He has astonished George the Fourth!
(On account of which, I had that canvass new-painted, him with a bag
of money in his hand, a presentin it to George the Fourth, and a
lady in Ostrich Feathers fallin in love with him in a bag-wig,
sword, and buckles correct.)
I took the House as is the subject of present inquiries--though not
the honour of bein acquainted--and I run Magsman's Amusements in it
thirteen months--sometimes one thing, sometimes another, sometimes
nothin particular, but always all the canvasses outside. One night,
when we had played the last company out, which was a shy company,
through its raining Heavens hard, I was takin a pipe in the one pair
back along with the young man with the toes, which I had taken on
for a month (though he never drawed--except on paper), and I heard a
kickin at the street door. "Halloa!" I says to the young man,
"what's up!" He rubs his eyebrows with his toes, and he says, "I
can't imagine, Mr. Magsman"--which he never could imagine nothin,
and was monotonous company.
The noise not leavin off, I laid down my pipe, and I took up a
candle, and I went down and opened the door. I looked out into the
street; but nothin could I see, and nothin was I aware of, until I
turned round quick, because some creetur run between my legs into
the passage. There was Mr. Chops!
"Magsman," he says, "take me, on the old terms, and you've got me;
if it's done, say done!"
I was all of a maze, but I said, "Done, sir."
"Done to your done, and double done!" says he. "Have you got a bit
of supper in the house?"
Bearin in mind them sparklin warieties of foreign drains as we'd
guzzled away at in Pall Mall, I was ashamed to offer him cold
sassages and gin-and-water; but he took 'em both and took 'em free;
havin a chair for his table, and sittin down at it on a stool, like
hold times. I, all of a maze all the while.
It was arter he had made a clean sweep of the sassages (beef, and to
the best of my calculations two pound and a quarter), that the
wisdom as was in that little man began to come out of him like
prespiration.
"Magsman," he says, "look upon me! You see afore you, One as has
both gone into Society and come out."
"O! You ARE out of it, Mr. Chops? How did you get out, sir?"
"SOLD OUT!" says he. You never saw the like of the wisdom as his Ed
expressed, when he made use of them two words.
"My friend Magsman, I'll impart to you a discovery I've made. It's
wallable; it's cost twelve thousand five hundred pound; it may do
you good in life--The secret of this matter is, that it ain't so
much that a person goes into Society, as that Society goes into a
person."
Not exactly keepin up with his meanin, I shook my head, put on a
deep look, and said, "You're right there, Mr. Chops."
"Magsman," he says, twitchin me by the leg, "Society has gone into
me, to the tune of every penny of my property."
I felt that I went pale, and though nat'rally a bold speaker, I
couldn't hardly say, "Where's Normandy?"
"Bolted. With the plate," said Mr. Chops.
"And t'other one?" meaning him as formerly wore the bishop's mitre.
"Bolted. With the jewels," said Mr. Chops.
I sat down and looked at him, and he stood up and looked at me.
"Magsman," he says, and he seemed to myself to get wiser as he got
hoarser; "Society, taken in the lump, is all dwarfs. At the court
of St. James's, they was all a doing my old business--all a goin
three times round the Cairawan, in the hold court-suits and
properties. Elsewheres, they was most of 'em ringin their little
bells out of make-believes. Everywheres, the sarser was a goin
round. Magsman, the sarser is the uniwersal Institution!"
I perceived, you understand, that he was soured by his misfortunes,
and I felt for Mr. Chops.
"As to Fat Ladies," he says, giving his head a tremendious one agin
the wall, "there's lots of THEM in Society, and worse than the
original. HERS was a outrage upon Taste--simply a outrage upon
Taste--awakenin contempt--carryin its own punishment in the form of
a Indian." Here he giv himself another tremendious one. "But
THEIRS, Magsman, THEIRS is mercenary outrages. Lay in Cashmeer
shawls, buy bracelets, strew 'em and a lot of 'andsome fans and
things about your rooms, let it be known that you give away like
water to all as come to admire, and the Fat Ladies that don't
exhibit for so much down upon the drum, will come from all the pints
of the compass to flock about you, whatever you are. They'll drill
holes in your 'art, Magsman, like a Cullender. And when you've no
more left to give, they'll laugh at you to your face, and leave you
to have your bones picked dry by Wulturs, like the dead Wild Ass of
the Prairies that you deserve to be!" Here he giv himself the most
tremendious one of all, and dropped.
I thought he was gone. His Ed was so heavy, and he knocked it so
hard, and he fell so stoney, and the sassagerial disturbance in him
must have been so immense, that I thought he was gone. But, he soon
come round with care, and he sat up on the floor, and he said to me,
with wisdom comin out of his eyes, if ever it come:
"Magsman! The most material difference between the two states of
existence through which your unhappy friend has passed;" he reached
out his poor little hand, and his tears dropped down on the
moustachio which it was a credit to him to have done his best to
grow, but it is not in mortals to command success,--"the difference
this. When I was out of Society, I was paid light for being seen.
When I went into Society, I paid heavy for being seen. I prefer the
former, even if I wasn't forced upon it. Give me out through the
trumpet, in the hold way, to-morrow."
Arter that, he slid into the line again as easy as if he had been
iled all over. But the organ was kep from him, and no allusions was
ever made, when a company was in, to his property. He got wiser
every day; his views of Society and the Public was luminous,
bewilderin, awful; and his Ed got bigger and bigger as his Wisdom
expanded it.
He took well, and pulled 'em in most excellent for nine weeks. At
the expiration of that period, when his Ed was a sight, he expressed
one evenin, the last Company havin been turned out, and the door
shut, a wish to have a little music.
"Mr. Chops," I said (I never dropped the "Mr." with him; the world
might do it, but not me); "Mr. Chops, are you sure as you are in a
state of mind and body to sit upon the organ?"
His answer was this: "Toby, when next met with on the tramp, I
forgive her and the Indian. And I am."
It was with fear and trembling that I began to turn the handle; but
he sat like a lamb. I will be my belief to my dying day, that I see
his Ed expand as he sat; you may therefore judge how great his
thoughts was. He sat out all the changes, and then he come off.
"Toby," he says, with a quiet smile, "the little man will now walk
three times round the Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain."
When we called him in the morning, we found him gone into a much
better Society than mine or Pall Mall's. I giv Mr. Chops as
comfortable a funeral as lay in my power, followed myself as Chief,
and had the George the Fourth canvass carried first, in the form of
a banner. But, the House was so dismal arterwards, that I giv it
up, and took to the Wan again.
"I don't triumph," said Jarber, folding up the second manuscript,
and looking hard at Trottle. "I don't triumph over this worthy
creature. I merely ask him if he is satisfied now?"
"How can he be anything else?" I said, answering for Trottle, who
sat obstinately silent. "This time, Jarber, you have not only read
us a delightfully amusing story, but you have also answered the
question about the House. Of course it stands empty now. Who would
think of taking it after it had been turned into a caravan?" I
looked at Trottle, as I said those last words, and Jarber waved his
hand indulgently in the same direction.
"Let this excellent person speak," said Jarber. "You were about to
say, my good man?" -
"I only wished to ask, sir," said Trottle doggedly, "if you could
kindly oblige me with a date or two in connection with that last
story?"
"A date!" repeated Jarber. "What does the man want with dates!"
"I should be glad to know, with great respect," persisted Trottle,
"if the person named Magsman was the last tenant who lived in the
House. It's my opinion--if I may be excused for giving it--that he
most decidedly was not."
With those words, Trottle made a low bow, and quietly left the room.
There is no denying that Jarber, when we were left together, looked
sadly discomposed. He had evidently forgotten to inquire about
dates; and, in spite of his magnificent talk about his series of
discoveries, it was quite as plain that the two stories he had just
read, had really and truly exhausted his present stock. I thought
myself bound, in common gratitude, to help him out of his
embarrassment by a timely suggestion. So I proposed that he should
come to tea again, on the next Monday evening, the thirteenth, and
should make such inquiries in the meantime, as might enable him to
dispose triumphantly of Trottle's objection.
He gallantly kissed my hand, made a neat little speech of
acknowledgment, and took his leave. For the rest of the week I
would not encourage Trottle by allowing him to refer to the House at
all. I suspected he was making his own inquiries about dates, but I
put no questions to him.
On Monday evening, the thirteenth, that dear unfortunate Jarber
came, punctual to the appointed time. He looked so terribly
harassed, that he was really quite a spectacle of feebleness and
fatigue. I saw, at a glance, that the question of dates had gone
against him, that Mr. Magsman had not been the last tenant of the
House, and that the reason of its emptiness was still to seek.
"What I have gone through," said Jarber, "words are not eloquent
enough to tell. O Sophonisba, I have begun another series of
discoveries! Accept the last two as stories laid on your shrine;
and wait to blame me for leaving your curiosity unappeased, until
you have heard Number Three."
Number Three looked like a very short manuscript, and I said as
much. Jarber explained to me that we were to have some poetry this
time. In the course of his investigations he had stepped into the
Circulating Library, to seek for information on the one important
subject. All the Library-people knew about the House was, that a
female relative of the last tenant, as they believed, had, just
after that tenant left, sent a little manuscript poem to them which
she described as referring to events that had actually passed in the
House; and which she wanted the proprietor of the Library to
publish. She had written no address on her letter; and the
proprietor had kept the manuscript ready to be given back to her
(the publishing of poems not being in his line) when she might call
for it. She had never called for it; and the poem had been lent to
Jarber, at his express request, to read to me.
Before he began, I rang the bell for Trottle; being determined to
have him present at the new reading, as a wholesome check on his
obstinacy. To my surprise Peggy answered the bell, and told me,
that Trottle had stepped out without saying where. I instantly felt
the strongest possible conviction that he was at his old tricks:
and that his stepping out in the evening, without leave, meant--
Philandering.
Controlling myself on my visitor's account, I dismissed Peggy,
stifled my indignation, and prepared, as politely as might be, to
listen to Jarber.
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