Jorrocks’ Jaunts and Jollities

Robert Surtees

CONTENTS

I. THE SWELL AND THE SURREY

What true-bred city sportsman has not in his day put
off the most urgent business—perhaps his marriage, or
even the interment of his rib—that he might “brave
the morn” with that renowned pack, the Surrey subscription
foxhounds? Lives there, we would ask, a
thoroughbred, prime, bang-up, slap-dash, break-neck,
out-and-out artist, within three miles of the Monument,
who has not occasionally “gone a good ‘un” with this
celebrated pack? And shall we, the bard of Eastcheap,
born all deeds of daring to record, shall we, who so oft
have witnessed—nay, shared—the hardy exploits of our
fellow-cits, shall we sit still, and never cease the eternal
twirl of our dexter around our sinister thumb, while
other scribes hand down to future ages the paltry feats
of beardless Meltonians, and try to shame old Father
Thames himself with muddy Whissendine’s foul stream?
Away! thou vampire, Indolence, that suckest the marrow
of imagination, and fattenest on the cream of idea ere
yet it float on the milk of reflection. Hence! slug-begotten
hag, thy power is gone—the murky veil thou’st drawn
o’er memory’s sweetest page is rent!

Harp of Eastcheap, awake!

Our thoughts hark back to the cover-side, and our
heart o’erflows with recollections of the past, when life
rode the pace through our veins, and the bark of the
veriest mongrel, or the bray of the sorriest costermonger’s
sorriest “Jerusalem,” were far more musical sounds than
Paganini’s pizzicatos or Catalani’s clamorous caterwaulings.

And, thou, Goddess of the Silver Bow—chaste Diana—deign
to become the leading star of our lucubrations;
come perch upon our grey goose quill; shout in our ear
the maddening Tally-ho! and ever and anon give a
salutary “refresher” to our memory with thy heaven-wrought
spurs—those spurs old Vulcan forged when in
his maddest mood—whilst we relate such feats of town-born
youths and city squires, as shall “harrow up the
souls” of milk-sop Melton’s choicest sons, and “fright
their grass-galloping garrons from their propriety.” But
gently, Pegasus!—Here again, boys, and “let’s to
business,” as they say on ‘Change.

‘Twere almost needless to inform our readers, that
such portion of a county as is hunted by any one pack
of hounds is technically denominated their country;
and of all countries under the sun, that of the Surrey
subscription foxhounds undoubtedly bears the bell.
This superiority arises from the peculiar nature of the
soil—wretched starvation stuff most profusely studded
with huge sharp flints—the abundance of large woods,
particularly on the Kent side, and the range of mountainous
hills that run directly through the centre, which
afford accommodation to the timid, and are unknown
in most counties and unequalled in any.

One of the most striking features in the aspect of
this chosen region of fox-hunting, is the quiet easy
manner in which the sportsmen take the thing. On they
go—now trotting gently over the flints—now softly
ambling along the grassy ridge of some stupendous
hill—now quietly following each other in long-drawn
files, like geese, through some close and deep ravine,
or interminable wood, which re-echoes to their never-ceasing
holloas—every man shouting in proportion to
the amount of his subscription, until day is made
horrible with their yelling. There is no pushing, jostling,
rushing, cramming, or riding over one another; no
jealousy, discord, or daring; no ridiculous foolhardy
feats; but each man cranes and rides, and rides and
cranes in a style that would gladden the eye of a
director of an insurance office.

The members of the Surrey are the people that
combine business with pleasure, and even in the severest
run can find time for sweet discourse, and talk about the
price of stocks or stockings. “Yooi wind him there, good
dog, yooi wind him.”—”Cottons is fell.”—”Hark to
Cottager! Hark!”—”Take your bill at three months,
or give you three and a half discount for cash.” “Eu in
there, eu in, Cheapside, good dog.”—”Don’t be in a
hurry, sir, pray. He may be in the empty casks behind
the cooper’s. Yooi, try for him, good bitch. Yooi, push
him out.”—”You’re not going down that bank, surely
sir? Why, it’s almost perpendicular! For God’s sake, sir,
take care—remember you are not insured. Ah! you
had better get off—here, let me hold your nag, and when
you’re down you can catch mine;—that’s your sort but
mind he doesn’t break the bridle. He won’t run away,
for he knows I’ve got some sliced carrots in my pocket
to reward him if he does well.—Thank you, sir, and now
for a leg up—there we are—that’s your sort—I’ll wait
till you are up also, and we’ll be off together.”

It is this union of the elegant courtesies and business
of life with the energetic sports of the field, that constitutes
the charm of Surrey hunting; and who can
wonder that smoke-dried cits, pent up all the week,
should gladly fly from their shops to enjoy a day’s
sport on a Saturday? We must not, however, omit
to express a hope that young men, who have their way
to make in the world, may not be led astray by its
allurements. It is all very well for old-established shopkeepers
“to do a bit of pleasure” occasionally, but the
apprentice or journeyman, who understands his duties
and the tricks of his trade, will never be found capering
in the hunting field. He will feel that his proper place is
behind the counter; and while his master is away
enjoying the pleasures of the chase, he can prig as
much “pewter” from the till as will take both himself
and his lass to Sadler’s Wells theatre, or any other
place she may choose to appoint.

But to return to the Surrey. The town of Croydon,
nine miles from the standard in Cornhill, is the general
rendezvous of the gallant sportsmen. It is the principal
market town in the eastern division of the county of
Surrey; and the chaw-bacons who carry the produce of
their acres to it, instead of to the neighbouring village
of London, retain much of their pristine barbarity. The
town furnishes an interesting scene on a hunting morning,
particularly on a Saturday. At an early hour, groups
of grinning cits may be seen pouring in from the London
side, some on the top of Cloud’s coaches,¹ some in taxed
carts, but the greater number mounted on good serviceable-looking
nags, of the invaluable species, calculated
for sport or business, “warranted free from vice, and
quiet both to ride and in harness”; some few there are,
who, with that kindness and considerate attention which
peculiarly mark this class of sportsmen, have tacked a
buggy to their hunter, and given a seat to a friend, who
leaning over the back of the gig, his jocund phiz turned
towards his fidus Achates, leads his own horse behind,
listening to the discourse of “his ancient,” or regaling
him “with sweet converse”; and thus they onward jog,
until the sign of the “Greyhound,” stretching quite
across the main street, greets their expectant optics,
and seems to forbid their passing the open portal below.
In they wend then, and having seen their horses
“sorted,” and the collar marks (as much as may be)
carefully effaced by the shrewd application of a due
quantity of grease and lamp-black, speed in to “mine
host” and order a sound repast of the good things of
this world; the which to discuss, they presently apply
themselves with a vigour that indicates as much a
determination to recruit fatigue endured, as to lay in
stock against the effects of future exertion. Meanwhile
the bustle increases; sportsmen arrive by the score,
fresh tables are laid out, covered with “no end” of
vivers; and towards the hour of nine, may be heard to
perfection, that pleasing assemblage of sounds issuing
from the masticatory organs of a number of men steadfastly
and studiously employed in the delightful occupation
of preparing their mouthfuls for deglutition. “O
noctes coenæque Deûm,” said friend Flaccus. Oh, hunting
breakfasts! say we. Where are now the jocund laugh,
the repartee, the oft-repeated tale, the last debate? As
our sporting contemporary, the Quarterly, said, when
describing the noiseless pursuit of old reynard by the
Quorn: “Reader, there is no crash now, and not much
music.” It is the tinker that makes a great noise over
a little work, but, at the pace these men are eating,
there is no time for babbling. So, gentle lector, there is
now no leisure for bandying compliments, ’tis your
small eater alone who chatters o’er his meals; your
true-born sportsman is ever a silent and, consequently,
an assiduous grubber. True it is that occasionally
space is found between mouthfuls to vociferate
“WAITER!” in a tone that requires not repetition;
and most sonorously do the throats of the assembled
eaters re-echo the sound; but this is all—no useless
exuberance of speech—no, the knife or fork is directed
towards what is wanted, nor needs there any more
expressive intimation of the applicant’s wants.

Footnote 1: (return) The date of this description, it must be remembered, is put
many years back.

At length the hour of ten approaches; bills are paid,
pocket-pistols filled, sandwiches stowed away, horses
accoutred, and our bevy straddle forth into the town,
to the infinite gratification of troops of dirty-nosed
urchins, who, for the last hour, have been peeping in
at the windows, impatiently watching for the exeunt
of our worthies.—They mount, and away—trot, trot—bump,
bump—trot, trot—bump, bump—over Addington
Heath, through the village, and up the hill to Hayes
Common, which having gained, spurs are applied, and
any slight degree of pursiness that the good steeds may
have acquired by standing at livery in Cripplegate, or
elsewhere, is speedily pumped out of them by a smart
brush over the turf, to the “Fox,” at Keston, where
a numerous assemblage of true sportsmen patiently
await the usual hour for throwing off. At length time
being called, say twenty minutes to eleven, and
Mr. Jorrocks, Nodding Homer, and the principal
subscribers having cast up, the hounds approach the
cover. “Yooi in there!” shouts Tom Hills, who has
long hunted this crack pack; and crack! crack! crack!
go the whips of some scores of sportsmen. “Yelp,
yelp, yelp,” howl the hounds; and in about a quarter
of an hour Tom has not above four or five couple at
his heels. This number being a trifle, Tom runs his prad
at a gap in the fence by the wood-side; the old nag goes
well at it, but stops short at the critical moment, and,
instead of taking the ditch, bolts and wheels round.
Tom, however, who is “large in the boiling pieces,” as
they say at Whitechapel, is prevented by his weight
from being shaken out of his saddle; and, being resolved
to take no denial, he lays the crop of his hunting-whip
about the head of his beast, and runs him at the same
spot a second time, with an obligato accompaniment of
his spur-rowels, backed by a “curm along then!” issued
in such a tone as plainly informs his quadruped he is in
no joking humour. These incentives succeed in landing
Tom and his nag in the wished-for spot, when, immediately,
the wood begins to resound with shouts of
“Yoicks True-bo-y, yoicks True-bo-y, yoicks push him
up, yoicks wind him!” and the whole pack begin to
work like good ‘uns. Occasionally may be heard the
howl of some unfortunate hound that has been caught
in a fox trap, or taken in a hare snare; and not unfrequently
the discordant growls of some three or four
more, vociferously quarrelling over the venerable
remains of some defunct rabbit. “Oh, you rogues!”
cries Mr. Jorrocks, a cit rapturously fond of the sport.
After the lapse of half an hour the noise in the wood
for a time increases audibly. ‘Tis Tom chastising the
gourmands. Another quarter of an hour, and a hound
that has finished his coney bone slips out of the wood,
and takes a roll upon the greensward, opining, no
doubt, that such pastime is preferable to scratching
his hide among brambles in the covers. “Hounds have
no right to opine,” opines the head whipper-in; so
clapping spurs into his prad, he begins to pursue the
delinquent round the common, with “Markis, Markis!
what are you at, Markis? get into cover, Markis!”
But “it’s no go”; Marquis creeps through a hedge,
and “grins horribly a ghastly smile” at his ruthless
tormentor, who wends back, well pleased at having had
an excuse for taking “a bit gallop”! Half an hour more
slips away, and some of the least hasty of our cits begin
to wax impatient, in spite of the oft-repeated admonition,
“don’t be in a hurry!” At length a yokel pops out
of the cover, and as soon as he has recovered breath,
informs the field that he has been “a-hollorin’ to ’em for
half an hour,” and that the fox had “gone away for Tatsfield,
‘most as soon as ever the ‘oounds went into ‘ood.”

All is now hurry-scurry—girths are tightened—reins
gathered up—half-munched sandwiches thrust into the
mouth—pocket-pistols applied to—coats comfortably
buttoned up to the throat; and, these preparations
made, away goes the whole field, “coolly and fairly,”
along the road to Leaves Green and Crown Ash Hill—from
which latter spot, the operations of the pack in
the bottom may be comfortably and securely viewed—leaving
the whips to flog as many hounds out of cover
as they can, and Tom to entice as many more as are
willing to follow the “twang, twang, twang” of his horn.

And now, a sufficient number of hounds having been
seduced from the wood, forth sallies “Tummas,” and
making straight for the spot where our yokel’s “mate”
stands leaning on his plough-stilts, obtains from him the
exact latitude and longitude of the spot where reynard
broke through the hedge. To this identical place is the
pack forthwith led; and, no sooner have they reached it,
than the wagging of their sterns clearly shows how
genuine is their breed. Old Strumpet, at length, first
looking up in Tom’s face for applause, ventures to send
forth a long-drawn howl, which, coupled with Tom’s
screech, setting the rest agog, away they all go, like
beans; and the wind, fortunately setting towards Westerham,
bears the melodious sound to the delighted ears
of our “roadsters,” who, forthwith catching the infection,
respond with deafening shouts and joyous yells,
set to every key, and disdaining the laws of harmony.
Thus, what with Tom’s horn, the holloaing of the whips,
and the shouts of the riders, a very pretty notion may
be formed of what Virgil calls:

A terrible noise is the result!

At the end of nine minutes or so, the hounds come to
fault in the bottom, below the blacksmith’s, at Crown
Ash Hill, and the fox has a capital chance; in fact,
they have changed for the blacksmith’s tom cat, which
rushed out before them, and finding their mistake,
return at their leisure. This gives the most daring of
the field, on the eminence, an opportunity of descending
to view the sport more closely; and being assembled in
the bottom, each congratulates his neighbour on the
excellent condition and stanchness of the hounds, and
the admirable view that has been afforded them of
their peculiar style of hunting. At this interesting period,
a “regular swell” from Melton Mowbray, unknown to
everyone except his tailor, to whom he owes a long
tick, makes his appearance and affords abundance of
merriment for our sportsmen. He is just turned out
of the hands of his valet, and presents the very beau-ideal
of his caste—”quite the lady,” in fact. His hat
is stuck on one side, displaying a profusion of well-waxed
ringlets; a corresponding infinity of whisker, terminating
at the chin, there joins an enormous pair of moustaches,
which give him the appearance of having caught the
fox himself and stuck its brush below his nose. His
neck is very stiff; and the exact Jackson-like fit of his
coat, which almost nips him in two at the waist, and his
superlatively well-cleaned leather Andersons,² together
with the perfume and the general puppyism of his
appearance, proclaim that he is a “swell” of the very
first water, and one that a Surrey sportsman would like
to buy at his own price and sell at the other’s. In addition
to this, his boots, which his “fellow” has just
denuded from a pair of wash-leather covers, are of the
finest, brightest, blackest patent leather imaginable;
the left one being the identical boot by which Warren’s
monkey shaved himself, while the right is the one at
which the game-cock pecked, mistaking its own shadow
for an opponent, the mark of its bill being still visible
above the instep; and the tops—whose pampered
appetites have been fed on champagne—are of the
most delicate cream-colour, the whole devoid of mud
or speck. The animal he bestrides is no less calculated
than himself to excite the risible faculties of the field,
being a sort of mouse colour, with dun mane and tail,
got by Nicolo, out of a flibbertigibbet mare, and he
stands seventeen hands and an inch. His head is small
and blood-like, his girth a mere trifle, and his legs, very
long and spidery, of course without any hair at the
pasterns to protect them from the flints; his whole
appearance bespeaking him fitter to run for half-mile
hunters’ stakes at Croxton Park or Leicester, than
contend for foxes’ brushes in such a splendid country
as the Surrey. There he stands, with his tail stuck
tight between his legs, shivering and shaking for all
the world as if troubled with a fit of ague. And well he
may, poor beast, for—oh, men of Surrey, London, Kent,
and Middlesex, hearken to my word—on closer inspection
he proves to have been shaved!!!³

Footnote 2: (return) Anderson, of South Audley Street, is, or was, a famous
breeches-maker.

Footnote 3: (return) Shaving was in great vogue at Melton some seasons back. It
was succeeded by clipping, and clipping by singeing.

After a considerable time spent in casting to the
right, the left, and the rear, “True-bouy” chances to
take a fling in advance, and hitting upon the scent,
proclaims it with his wonted energy, which drawing all
his brethren to the spot, they pick it slowly over some
brick-fields and flint-beds, to an old lady’s flower-garden,
through which they carry it with a surprising
head into the fields beyond, when they begin to fall
into line, and the sportsmen doing the same—”one at
a time and it will last the longer”—”Tummas” tootles
his horn, the hunt is up, and away they all rattle at
“Parliament pace,” as the hackney-coachmen say.

Our swell, who flatters himself he can “ride a few,”
according to the fashion of his country, takes up a line
of his own, abreast of the leading hounds, notwithstanding
the oft vociferated cry of “Hold hard, sir!” “Pray,
hold hard, sir!” “For God’s sake, hold hard, sir!”
“G—d d—n you, hold hard, sir!” “Where the h—ll
are you going to, sir?” and other familiar inquiries and
benedictions, with which a stranger is sometimes greeted,
who ventures to take a look at a strange pack of hounds.

In the meantime the fox, who has often had a game
at romps with his pursuers, being resolved this time to
give them a tickler, bears straight away for Westerham,
to the infinite satisfaction of the “hill folks,” who thus
have an excellent opportunity of seeing the run without
putting their horses to the trouble of “rejoicing in their
strength, or pawing in the valley.” But who is so fortunate
as to be near the scene of action in this second
scurry, almost as fast as the first? Our fancy supplies
us, and there not being many, we will just initialise
them all, and let he whom the cap fits put it on.

If we look to the left, nearly abreast of the three
couple of hounds that are leading by some half mile or
so, we shall see “Swell”—like a monkey on a giraffe—striding
away in the true Leicestershire style; the animal
contracting its stride after every exertion in pulling its
long legs out of the deep and clayey soil, until the
Bromley barber, who has been quilting his mule along
at a fearful rate, and in high dudgeon at anyone presuming
to exercise his profession upon a dumb brute,
overtakes him, and in the endeavour to pass, lays it
into his mule in a style that would insure him rotatory
occupation at Brixton for his spindles, should any
member of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty
to Animals witness his proceedings; while his friend
and neighbour old B——, the tinker, plies his little
mare with the Brummagems, to be ready to ride over
“Swell” the instant the barber gets him down. On the
right of the leading hounds are three crack members of
the Surrey, Messrs. B—e, S—bs, and B—l, all lads who
can go; while a long way in the rear of the body of the
pack are some dozen, who, while they sat on the hills,
thought they could also, but who now find out their
mistake. Down Windy Lane, a glimpse of a few red
coats may be caught passing the gaps and weak parts
of the fence, among whom we distinctly recognise the
worthy master of the pack, followed by Jorrocks, with
his long coat-laps floating in the breeze, who thinking
that “catching-time” must be near at hand, and being
dearly fond of blood, has descended from his high station
to witness the close of the scene. “Vot a pace! and vot a
country!” cries the grocer, standing high in his stirrups,
and bending over the neck of his chestnut as though he
were meditating a plunge over his head; “how they
stick to him! vot a pack! by Jove they are at fault
again. Yooi, Pilgrim! Yooi, Warbler, ma load! (lad).
Tom, try down the hedge-row.” “Hold your jaw,
Mr. J——,” cries Tom, “you are always throwing that
red rag of yours. I wish you would keep your potato-trap
shut. See! you’ve made every hound throw up,
and it’s ten to one that ne’er a one among ’em will
stoop again.” “Yonder he goes,” cries a cock of the old
school, who used to hunt with Colonel Jolliffe’s hounds,
and still sports the long blue surtout lined with orange,
yellow-ochre unmentionables, and mahogany-coloured
knee-caps, with mother-of-pearl buttons. “Yonder he
goes among the ship (sheep), for a thousand! see how the
skulking waggabone makes them scamper.” At this
particular moment a shrill scream is heard at the far
end of a long shaw, and every man pushes on to the
best of his endeavour. “Holloo o-o-u, h’loo o-o-u, h’loo—o-o-u,
gone away! gone away! forward! forrard! hark
back! hark forrard! hark forrard! hark back!” resounds
from every mouth. “He’s making for the ‘oods beyond
Addington, and we shall have a rare teaser up these hills,”
cries Jorrocks, throwing his arms round his horse’s neck
as he reaches the foot of them.—”D—n your hills,”
cries “Swell,” as he suddenly finds himself sitting on
the hindquarters of his horse, his saddle having slipped
back for want of a breastplate,—”I wish the hills had
been piled on your back, and the flints thrust down your
confounded throat, before I came into such a cursed
provincial.” “Haw, haw, haw!” roars a Croydon butcher.
“What don’t ‘e like it, sir, eh? too sharp to be pleasant,
eh?—Your nag should have put on his boots before he
showed among us.”

“He’s making straight for Fuller’s farm,” exclaims a
thirsty veteran on reaching the top, “and I’ll pull up
and have a nip of ale, please God.” “Hang your ale,”
cries a certain sporting cheesemonger, “you had better
come out with a barrel of it tacked to your horse’s
tail.”—”Or ‘unt on a steam-engine,” adds his friend
the omnibus proprietor, “and then you can brew as
you go.” “We shall have the Croydon Canal,” cries
Mr. H——n, of Tottenham, who knows every flint in
the country, “and how will you like that, my hearties?”
“Curse the Croydon Canal,” bawls the little Bromley
barber, “my mule can swim like a soap-bladder, and my
toggery can’t spoil, thank God!”

The prophecy turns up. Having skirted Fuller’s farm,
the villain finds no place to hide; and in two minutes, or
less, the canal appears in view. It is full of craft, and the
locks are open, but there is a bridge about half a mile to
the right. “If my horse can do nothing else he can jump
this,” cries “Swell,” as he gathers him together, and
prepares for the effort. He hardens his heart and goes
at it full tilt, and the leggy animal lands him three
yards on the other side. “Curse this fellow,” cries
Jorrocks, grinning with rage as he sees “Swell” skimming
through the air like a swallow on a summer’s eve, “he’ll
have a laugh at the Surrey, for ever and ever, Amen.
Oh, dear! oh, dear! I wish I durst leap it. What shall
I do? Here bargee,” cries he to a bargeman, “lend us a
help over and I’ll give you ninepence.” The bargeman
takes him at his word, and getting the vessel close to the
water’s edge, Jorrocks has nothing to do but ride in,
and, the opposite bank being accommodating, he lands
without difficulty. Ramming his spurs into his nag, he
now starts after “Swell,” who is sailing away with a
few couple of hounds that took the canal; the body of
the pack and all the rest of the field—except the Bromley
barber, who is now floundering in the water—having
gone round to the bridge.

The country is open, the line being across commons
and along roads, so that Jorrocks, who is not afraid of
“the pace” so long as there is no leaping, has a pretty
good chance with “Swell.” The scene now shifts. On
turning out of a lane, along which they have just rattled,
a fence of this description appears: The bottom part is
made of flints, and the upper part of mud, with gorse
stuck along the top, and there is a gutter on each side.
Jorrocks, seeing that a leap is likely, hangs astern, and
“Swell,” thinking to shake off his only opponent, and to
have a rare laugh at the Surrey when he gets back to
Melton, puts his nag at it most manfully, who, though
somewhat blown, manages to get his long carcass over,
but, unfortunately alighting on a bed of flints on the far
side, cuts a back sinew, and “Swell” measures his length
on the headland. Jorrocks then pulls up.

The tragedy of George Barnwell ends with a death,
and we are happy in being able to gratify our readers
with a similar entertainment. Already have the best-mounted
men in the field attained the summit of one of
the Mont Blancs of the country, when on looking down
the other side of the “mountain’s brow,” they, to their
infinite astonishment, espy at some distance our “Swell”
dismounted and playing at “pull devil, pull baker”
with the hounds, whose discordant bickerings rend the
skies. “Whoo-hoop!” cries one; “whoo-hoop!” responds
another; “whoo-hoop!” screams a third; and the contagion
spreading, and each man dismounting, they
descend the hill with due caution, whoo-hooping,
hallooing, and congratulating each other on the splendour
of the run, interspersed with divers surmises as
to what mighty magic had aided the hounds in getting
on such good terms with the warmint, and exclamations
at the good fortune of the stranger, in being able (by
nicking,⁴ and the fox changing his line) to get in at
the finish.

Footnote 4: (return) A stranger never rides straight if he beats the members
of the hunt.

And now some dozens of sportsmen quietly ambling
up to the scene of action, view with delight (alone
equalled by their wonder at so unusual and unexpected
an event) the quarrels of the hounds, as they dispute
with each other the possession of their victim’s remains,
when suddenly a gentleman, clad in a bright green silk-velvet
shooting-coat, with white leathers, and Hessian
boots with large tassels, carrying his Joe Manton on his
shoulder, issues from an adjoining coppice, and commences
a loud complaint of the “unhandsome conduct
of the gentlemen’s ‘ounds in devouring the ‘are (hare)
which he had taken so much pains to shoot.” Scarcely
are these words out of his mouth than the whole hunt,
from Jorrocks downwards, let drive such a rich torrent
of abuse at our unfortunate chasseur, that he is fain to
betake himself to his heels, leaving them undisputed
masters of the field.

The visages of our sportsmen become dismally
lengthened on finding that their fox has been “gathered
unto his fathers” by means of hot lead and that villainous
saltpetre “digged out of the bowels of the
harmless earth”; some few, indeed, there are who are
bold enough to declare that the pack has actually made
a meal of a hare, and that their fox is snugly earthed in
the neighbouring cover. However, as there are no
“reliquias Danaum,” to prove or disprove this assertion,
Tom Hills, having an eye to the cap-money, ventures to
give it as his opinion, that pug has fairly yielded to his
invincible pursuers, without having “dropped to shot.”
This appearing to give very general satisfaction, the
first whip makes no scruple of swearing that he saw
the hounds pull him down fairly; and Peckham, drawing
his mouth up on one side, with his usual intellectual
grin, takes a similar affidavit. The Bromley barber too,
anxious to have it to say that he has for once been in
at the death of a fox, vows by his beard that he saw
the “varmint” lathered in style; and these protestations
being received with clamorous applause, and
everyone being pleased to have so unusual an event to
record to his admiring spouse, agrees that a fox has not
only been killed, but killed in a most sportsmanlike,
workmanlike, businesslike manner; and long and loud
are the congratulations, great is the increased importance
of each man’s physiognomy, and thereupon they all lug
out their half-crowns for Tom Hills.

In the meantime our “Swell” lays hold of his nag—who
is sorely damaged with the flints, and whose wind
has been pretty well pumped out of him by the hills—and
proceeds to lead him back to Croydon, inwardly
promising himself for the future most studiously to
avoid the renowned county of Surrey, its woods, its
barbers, its mountains, and its flints, and to leave
more daring spirits to overcome the difficulties it
presents; most religiously resolving, at the same time,
to return as speedily as possible to his dear Leicestershire,
there to amble o’er the turf, and fancy himself
an “angel on horseback.” The story of the country
mouse, who must needs see the town, occurs forcibly
to his recollection, and he exclaims aloud:

On overhearing which, Mr. Jorrocks hurries back to his
brother subscribers, and informs them, very gravely,
that the stranger is no less a personage than “Prince
Matuchevitz, the Russian ambassador and minister
plenipotentiary extraordinary,” whereupon the whole
field join in wishing him safe back in Russia—or anywhere
else—and wonder at his incredible assurance in
supposing that he could cope with THE SURREY HUNT.

II. THE YORKSHIREMAN AND THE SURREY

It is an axiom among fox-hunters that the hounds they
individually hunt with are the best—compared with
them all others are “slow.”

Of this species of pardonable egotism, Mr. Jorrocks—who
in addition to the conspicuous place he holds in
the Surrey Hunt, as shown in the preceding chapter, we
should introduce to our readers as a substantial grocer
in St. Botolph’s Lane, with an elegant residence in
Great Coram Street, Russell Square—has his full, if
not rather more than his fair share. Vanity, however,
is never satisfied without display, and Mr. Jorrocks
longed for a customer before whom he could exhibit
the prowess of his⁵ pack.

Footnote 5: (return) Subscribers, speaking to strangers, always talk of the
hounds as their own.

Chance threw in his way a young Yorkshireman, who
frequently appearing in subsequent pages, we may
introduce as a loosish sort of hand, up to anything
in the way of a lark, but rather deficient in cash—a
character so common in London, as to render further
description needless.

Now it is well known that a Yorkshireman, like a
dragoon, is nothing without his horse, and if he does
understand anything better than racing—it is hunting.
Our readers will therefore readily conceive that a Yorkshireman
is more likely to be astonished at the possibility
of fox-hunting from London, than captivated by the
country, or style of turn-out; and in truth, looking at
it calmly and dispassionately, in our easy-chair drawn
to a window which overlooks the cream of the grazing
grounds in the Vale of White Horse, it does strike us
with astonishment, that such a thing as a fox should be
found within a day’s ride of the suburbs. The very idea
seems preposterous, for one cannot but associate the
charms of a “find” with the horrors of “going to
ground” in an omnibus, or the fox being headed by a
great Dr. Eady placard, or some such monstrosity.
Mr. Mayne,⁶ to be sure, has brought racing home to
every man’s door, but fox-hunting is not quite so
tractable a sport. But to our story.

Footnote 6: (return) The promoter of the Hippodrome, near Bayswater—a
speculation that soon came to grief.

It was on a nasty, cold, foggy, dark, drizzling morning
in the month of February, that the Yorkshireman, having
been offered a “mount” by Mr. Jorrocks, found himself
shivering under the Piazza in Covent Garden about seven
o’clock, surrounded by cabs, cabbages, carrots, ducks,
dollys, and drabs of all sorts, waiting for his horse and
the appearance of the friend who had seduced him into
the extraordinary predicament of attiring himself in
top-boots and breeches in London. After pacing up and
down some minutes, the sound of a horse’s hoofs were
heard turning down from Long Acre, and reaching the
lamp-post at the corner of James Street, his astonished
eyes were struck with the sight of a man in a capacious,
long, full-tailed, red frock coat reaching nearly to his
spurs, with mother-of-pearl buttons, with sporting
devices—which afterwards proved to be foxes, done in
black—brown shag breeches, that would have been
spurned by the late worthy master of the Hurworth,⁷
and boots, that looked for all the world as if they were
made to tear up the very land and soil, tied round the
knees with pieces of white tape, the flowing ends of
which dangled over the mahogany-coloured tops.
Mr. Jorrocks—whose dark collar, green to his coat,
and tout ensemble, might have caused him to be mistaken
for a mounted general postman—was on a most
becoming steed—a great raking, raw-boned chestnut,
with a twisted snaffle in his mouth, decorated with a
faded yellow silk front, a nose-band, and an ivory
ring under his jaws, for the double purpose of keeping
the reins together and Jorrocks’s teeth in his head—the
nag having flattened the noses and otherwise
damaged the countenances of his two previous owners,
who had not the knack of preventing him tossing his
head in their faces. The saddle—large and capacious—made
on the principle of the impossibility of putting
a round of beef upon a pudding plate—was “spick and
span new,” as was an enormous hunting-whip, whose
iron-headed hammer he clenched in a way that would
make the blood curdle in one’s veins, to see such an
instrument in the hands of a misguided man.

Footnote 7: (return) The late Mr. Wilkinson, commonly called “Matty Wilkinson,”
master of the Hurworth foxhounds, was a rigid adherent
of the “d——n-all-dandy” school of sportsmen.

“Punctuality is the politeness of princes,” said
Mr. Jorrocks, raising a broad-brimmed, lowish-crowned
hat, as high as a green hunting-cord which tackled
it to his yellow waistcoat by a fox’s tooth would allow,
as he came upon the Yorkshireman at the corner. “My
soul’s on fire and eager for the chase! By heavens, I declare
I’ve dreamt of nothing else all night, and the worst
of it is, that in a par-ox-ism of delight, when I thought
I saw the darlings running into the warmint, I brought
Mrs. J—— such a dig in the side as knocked her out of
bed, and she swears she’ll go to Jenner, and the court
for the protection of injured ribs! But come—jump up—where’s
your nag? Binjimin, you blackguard, where
are you? The fog is blinding me, I declare! Binjimin,
I say! Binjimin! you willain, where are you?”

“Here, sir! coming!” responded a voice from the
bottom of one of the long mugs at a street breakfast
stall, which the fog almost concealed from their view,
and presently an urchin in a drab coat and blue collar
came towing a wretched, ewe-necked, hungry-looking,
roan rosinante along from where he had been regaling
himself with a mug of undeniable bohea, sweetened with
a composition of brown sugar and sand.

“Now be after getting up,” said Jorrocks, “for time
and the Surrey ‘ounds wait for no man. That’s not a
werry elegant tit, but still it’ll carry you to Croydon
well enough, where I’ll put you on a most undeniable
bit of ‘orse-flesh—a reg’lar clipper. That’s a hack—what
they calls three-and-sixpence a side, but I only
pays half a crown. Now, Binjimin, cut away home,
and tell Batsay to have dinner ready at half-past five
to a minute, and to be most particular in doing the
lamb to a turn.”

The Yorkshireman having adjusted himself in the old
flat-flapped hack saddle, and got his stirrups let out
from “Binjimin’s” length to his own, gathered up the
stiff, weather-beaten reins, gave the animal a touch
with his spurs, and fell into the rear of Mr. Jorrocks.
The morning appeared to be getting worse. Instead of
the grey day-dawn of the country, when the thin
transparent mist gradually rises from the hills, revealing
an unclouded landscape, a dense, thick, yellow fog came
rolling in masses along the streets, obscuring the gas
lights, and rendering every step one of peril. It could be
both eat and felt, and the damp struck through their
clothes in the most summary manner. “This is bad,”
said Mr. Jorrocks, coughing as he turned the corner by
Drury Lane, making for Catherine Street, and upset an
early breakfast and periwinkle stall, by catching one
corner of the fragile fabric with his toe, having ridden
too near to the pavement. “Where are you for now?
and bad luck to ye, ye boiled lobster!” roared a stout
Irish wench, emerging from a neighbouring gin-palace
on seeing the dainty viands rolling in the street. “Cut
away!” cried Jorrocks to his friend, running his horse
between one of George Stapleton’s dust-carts and a
hackney-coach, “or the Philistines will be upon us.”
The fog and crowd concealed them, but “Holloa! mind
where you’re going, you great haw-buck!” from a buy-a-hearth-stone
boy, whose stock-in-trade Jorrocks nearly
demolished, as he crossed the corner of Catherine Street
before him, again roused his vigilance. “The deuce be
in the fog,” said he, “I declare I can’t see across the
Strand. It’s as dark as a wolf’s mouth.—Now where
are you going to with that meazly-looking cab of yours?—you’ve
nearly run your shafts into my ‘oss’s ribs!”
cried he to a cabman who nearly upset him. The Strand
was kept alive by a few slip-shod housemaids, on their
marrow-bones, washing the doorsteps, or ogling the
neighbouring pot-boy on his morning errand for the
pewters. Now and then a crazy jarvey passed slowly by,
while a hurrying mail, with a drowsy driver and sleeping
guard, rattled by to deliver their cargo at the post
office. Here and there appeared one of those beings,
who like the owl hide themselves by day, and are visible
only in the dusk. Many of them appeared to belong to
the other world. Poor, puny, ragged, sickly-looking
creatures, that seemed as though they had been suckled
and reared with gin. “How different,” thought the
Yorkshireman to himself, “to the fine, stout, active
labourer one meets at an early hour on a hunting
morning in the country!” His reverie was interrupted
on arriving opposite the Morning Chronicle office, by
the most discordant yells that ever issued from human
beings, and on examining the quarter from whence they
proceeded, a group of fifty or a hundred boys, or rather
little old men, were seen with newspapers in their hands
and under their arms, in all the activity of speculation
and exchange. “A clean Post for Tuesday’s Times!”
bellowed one. “I want the Hurl! (Herald) for the
Satirist!” shouted another. “Bell’s Life for the Bull!
The Spectator for the Sunday Times!”

The approach of our sportsmen was the signal for a
change of the chorus, and immediately Jorrocks was
assailed with “A hunter! a hunter! crikey, a hunter!
My eyes! there’s a gamecock for you! Vot a beauty!
Vere do you turn out to-day? Vere’s the stag? Don’t
tumble off, old boy! ‘Ave you got ever a rope in your
pocket? Take Bell’s Life in London, vot contains all
the sporting news of the country! Vot a vip the gemman’s
got! Vot a precious basternadering he could give
us—my eyes, vot a swell!—vot a shocking bad hat!⁸—vot
shocking bad breeches!”

Footnote 8: (return) “Vot a shocking bad hat!”—a slang cockney phrase of
1831.

The fog, which became denser at every step, by the
time they reached St. Clement’s Danes rendered their
further progress almost impossible.—”Oh, dear! oh,
dear! how unlucky,” exclaimed Jorrocks, “I would
have given twenty pounds of best Twankay for a fine
day—and see what a thing we’ve got! Hold my ‘oss,”
said he to the Yorkshireman, “while I run into the
‘Angel,’ and borrow an argand burner, or we shall be
endorsed⁹ to a dead certainty.” Off he got, and ran to
the inn. Presently he emerged from the yard—followed
by horse-keepers, coach-washers, porters, cads, waiters
and others, amid loud cries of “Flare up, flare up, old
cock! talliho fox-hunter!”—with a bright mail-coach
footboard lamp, strapped to his middle, which, lighting
up the whole of his broad back now cased in scarlet,
gave him the appearance of a gigantic red-and-gold insurance
office badge, or an elderly cherub without wings.

Footnote 9: (return) City—for having a pole run into one’s rear.

The hackney-coach-and cab-men, along whose lines
they passed, could not make him out at all. Some
thought he was a mail-coach guard riding post with
the bags; but as the light was pretty strong he trotted
on regardless of observation. The fog, however, abated
none of its denseness even on the “Surrey side,” and
before they reached the “Elephant and Castle,” Jorrocks
had run against two trucks, three watercress women,
one pies-all-ot!-all-ot! man, dispersed a whole covey of
Welsh milkmaids, and rode slap over one end of a buy
‘at (hat) box! bonnet-box! man’s pole, damaging a
dozen paste-boards, and finally upsetting Balham Hill
Joe’s Barcelona “come crack ’em and try ’em” stall
at the door of the inn, for all whose benedictions, the
Yorkshireman, as this great fox-hunting knight-errant’s
“Esquire,” came in.

Here the Yorkshireman would fain have persuaded
Mr. Jorrocks to desist from his quixotic undertaking,
but he turned a deaf ear to his entreaties. “We are
getting fast into the country, and I hold it to be utterly
impossible for this fog to extend beyond Kennington
Common—’twill ewaporate, you’ll see, as we approach
the open. Indeed, if I mistake not, I begin to sniff the
morning air already, and hark! there’s a lark a-carrolling
before us!” “Now, spooney! where are you for?”
bellowed a carter, breaking off in the middle of his
whistle, as Jorrocks rode slap against his leader, the
concussion at once dispelling the pleasing pastoral
delusion, and nearly knocking Jorrocks off his horse.

As they approached Brixton Hill, a large red ball of
lurid light appeared in the firmament, and just at the
moment up rode another member of the Surrey Hunt
in uniform, whom Jorrocks hailed as Mr. Crane. “By
Jove, ‘ow beautiful the moon is,” said the latter, after
the usual salutations. “Moon!” said Mr. Jorrocks,
“that’s not never no moon—I reckon it’s Mrs. Graham’s
balloon.” “Come, that’s a good ‘un,” said Crane, “perhaps
you’ll lay me an ‘at about it”. “Done!” said Mr. Jorrocks,
“a guinea one—and we’ll ax my friend here.—Now,
what’s that?” “Why, judging from its position and the
hour, I should say it is the sun!” was the reply.

We have omitted to mention that this memorable day
was a Saturday, one on which civic sportsmen exhibit.
We may also premise, that the particular hunt we are
about to describe, took place when there were very
many packs of hounds within reach of the metropolis,
all of which boasted their respective admiring subscribers.
As our party proceeded they overtook a
gentleman perusing a long bill of the meets for the
next week, of at least half a dozen packs, the top of
the list being decorated with a cut of a stag-hunt, and
the bottom containing a notification that hunters were
“carefully attended to by Charles Morton,¹⁰ at the
‘Derby Arms,’ Croydon,” a snug rural auberge near the
barrack. On the hunting bill-of-fare, were Mr. Jolliffe’s
foxhounds, Mr. Meager’s harriers, the Derby staghounds,
the Sanderstead harriers, the Union foxhounds,
the Surrey foxhounds, rabbit beagles on Epsom Downs,
and dwarf foxhounds on Woolwich Common. What a
list to bewilder a stranger! The Yorkshireman left it
all to Mr. Jorrocks.

Footnote 10: (return) Where the carrion is, there will be the crow, and on the
demise of the “Surrey staggers,” Charley brushed off to the west,
to valet the gentlemen’s hunters that attend the Royal Stag
Hunt.—Vide Sir F. Grant’s picture of the meet of the Royal
Staghounds.

“You’re for Jolliffe, I suppose,” said the gentleman
with the bill, to another with a blue coat and buff lining.
“He’s at Chipstead Church—only six miles from Croydon,
a sure find and good country.” “What are you for,
Mr. Jorrocks?” inquired another in green, with black
velvet breeches, Hessian boots, and a red waistcoat,
who just rode up. “My own, to be sure,” said Jorrocks,
taking hold of the green collar of his coat, as much as
to say, “How can you ask such a question?” “Oh, no,”
said the gentleman in green, “Come to the stag—much
better sport—sure of a gallop—open country—get it
over soon—back in town before the post goes out.”
Before Mr. Jorrocks had time to make a reply to this
last interrogatory, they were overtaken by another
horseman, who came hopping along at a sort of a
butcher’s shuffle, on a worn-out, three-legged, four-cornered
hack, with one eye, a rat-tail, and a head as
large as a fiddle-case.—”Who’s for the blue mottles?”
said he, casting a glance at their respective coats, and
at length fixing it on the Yorkshireman. “Why, Dickens,
you’re not going thistle-whipping with that nice ‘orse
of yours,” said the gentleman in the velvets; “come and
see the stag turned out—sure of a gallop—no hedges—soft
country—plenty of publics—far better sport, man,
than pottering about looking for your foxes and hares,
and wasting your time; take my advice, and come with
me.” “But,” says Dickens, “my ‘orse won’t stand it;
I had him in the shay till eleven last night, and he came
forty-three mile with our traveller the day before, else
he’s a ‘good ‘un to go,’ as you know. Do you remember
the owdacious leap he took over the tinker’s tent, at
Epping ‘Unt, last Easter? How he astonished the
natives within!” “Yes; but then, you know, you fell
head-foremost through the canvas, and no wonder your
ugly mug frightened them,” replied he of the velvets.
“Ay; but that was in consequence of my riding by
balance instead of gripping with my legs,” replied
Dickens; “you see, I had taken seven lessons in riding
at the school in Bidborough Street, Burton Crescent,
and they always told me to balance myself equally on
the saddle, and harden my heart, and ride at whatever
came in the way; and the tinker’s tent coming
first, why, naturally enough, I went at it. But I have
had some practice since then, and, of course, can stick
on better. I have ‘unted regularly ever since, and can
‘do the trick’ now.” “What, summer and winter?”
said Jorrocks. “No,” replied he, “but I have ‘unted
regularly every fifth Saturday since the ‘unting began.”

After numerous discourses similar to the foregoing,
they arrived at the end of the first stage on the road to
the hunt, namely, the small town of Croydon, the
rendezvous of London sportsmen. The whole place was
alive with red coats, green coats, blue coats, black coats,
brown coats, in short, coats of all the colours of the
rainbow. Horsemen were mounting, horsemen were dismounting,
one-horse “shays” and two-horse chaises
were discharging their burdens, grooms were buckling
on their masters’ spurs, and others were pulling off
their overalls. Eschewing the “Greyhound,” they turn
short to the right, and make for the “Derby Arms”
hunting stables.

Charley Morton, a fine old boy of his age, was buckling
on his armour for the fight, for his soul, too, was “on fire,
and eager for the chase.” He was for the “venison”; and
having mounted his “deer-stalker,” was speedily joined
by divers perfect “swells,” in beautiful leathers, beautiful
coats, beautiful tops, beautiful everything, except
horses, and off they rode to cut in for the first course—a
stag-hunt on a Saturday being usually divided into three.

The ride down had somewhat sharpened Jorrocks’s
appetite; and feeling, as he said, quite ready for his
dinner, he repaired to Mr. Morton’s house—a kind of
sporting snuggery, everything in apple-pie order, and
very good—where he baited himself on sausages and
salt herrings, a basin of new milk, with some “sticking
powder” as he called it, alias rum, infused into it; and
having deposited a half-quartern loaf in one pocket, as
a sort of balance against a huge bunch of keys which
rattled in the other, he pulled out his watch, and finding
they had a quarter of an hour to spare, proposed to
chaperon the Yorkshireman on a tour of the hunting
stables. Jorrocks summoned the ostler, and with great
dignity led the way. “Humph,” said he, evidently disappointed
at seeing half the stalls empty, “no great
show this morning—pity—gentleman come from a
distance—should like to have shown him some good
nags.—What sort of a devil’s this?” “Oh, sir, he’s a
good ‘un, and nothing but a good ‘un!—Leap! Lord love
ye, he’ll leap anything. A railway cut, a windmill with
the sails going, a navigable river with ships—anything
in short. This is the ‘orse wot took the line of houses
down at Beddington the day they had the tremendious
run from Reigate Hill.” “And wot’s the grey in the
far stall?” “Oh, that’s Mr. Pepper’s old nag—Pepper-Caster
as we call him, since he threw the old gemman,
the morning they met at the ‘Leg-of-Mutton’ at Ashtead.
But he’s good for nothing. Bless ye! his tail shakes
for all the world like a pepper-box afore he’s gone half
a mile. Those be yours in the far stalls, and since they
were turned round I’ve won a bob of a gemman who
I bet I’d show him two ‘osses with their heads vere their
tails should be.¹¹ I always says,” added he with a leer,
“that you rides the best ‘osses of any gemman vot
comes to our governor’s.” This flattered Jorrocks, and
sidling up, he slipped a shilling into his hand, saying,
“Well—bring them out, and let’s see how they look
this morning.” The stall reins are slipped, and out they
step with their hoods on their quarters. One was a large,
fat, full-sized chestnut, with a white ratch down the
full extent of his face, a long square tail, bushy mane,
with untrimmed heels. The other was a brown, about
fifteen two, coarse-headed, with a rat-tail, and collar-marked.
The tackle was the same as they came down
with. “You’ll do the trick on that, I reckon,” said
Jorrocks, throwing his leg over the chestnut, and
looking askew at the Yorkshireman as he mounted.
“Tatt., and old Tatt., and Tatt. sen. before him, all
agree that they never knew a bad ‘oss with a rat-tail.”

Footnote 11: (return) A favourite joke among grooms when a horse is turned round
in his stall.

“But, let me tell you, you must be werry lively, if you
mean to live with our ‘ounds. They go like the wind.
But come! touch him with the spur, and let’s do a trot.”
The Yorkshireman obeyed, and getting into the main
street, onwards they jogged, right through Croydon,
and struck into a line of villas of all sorts, shapes, and
sizes, which extend for several miles along the road,
exhibiting all sorts of architecture, Gothic, Corinthian,
Doric, Ionic, Dutch, and Chinese. These gradually
diminished in number, and at length they found themselves
on an open heath, within a few miles of the meet
of the “Surrey foxhounds”. “Now”, says Mr. Jorrocks,
clawing up his smalls, “you will see the werry finest
pack of hounds in all England; I don’t care where the
next best are; and you will see as good a turn-out as
ever you saw in your life, and as nice a country to ride
over as ever you were in”.

They reach the meet—a wayside public-house on a
common, before which the hounds with their attendants
and some fifty or sixty horsemen, many of them in
scarlet, were assembled. Jorrocks was received with the
greatest cordiality, amid whoops and holloas, and cries
of “now Twankay!—now Sugar!—now Figs!” Waving
his hand in token of recognition, he passed on and made
straight for Tom Hill, with a face full of importance, and
nearly rode over a hound in his hurry. “Now, Tom,”
said he, with the greatest energy, “do, my good fellow,
strain every nerve to show sport to-day.—A gentleman
has come all the way from the north-east side of the
town of Boroughbridge, in the county of York, to see
our excellent ‘ounds, and I would fain have him galvanised.—Do
show us a run, and let it end with blood,
so that he may have something to tell the natives when
he gets back to his own parts. That’s him, see, sitting
under the yew-tree, in a bottle-green coat with basket
buttons, just striking a light on the pommel of his
saddle to indulge in a fumigation.—Keep your eye on
him all day, and if you can lead him over an awkward
place, and get him a purl, so much the better.—If he’ll
risk his neck I’ll risk my ‘oss’s.”

The Yorkshireman, having lighted his cigar and
tightened his girths, rode leisurely among the horsemen,
many of whom were in eager council, and a gentle
breeze wafted divers scraps of conversation to his ear.

What is that hound got by? No. How is that horse
bred? No. What sport had you on Wednesday? No.
Is it a likely find to-day? No, no, no; it was not where
the hounds, but what the Consols, left off at; what the
four per cents, and not the four horses, were up to; what
the condition of the money, not the horse, market.
“Anything doing in Danish bonds, sir?” said one. “You
must do it by lease and release, and levy a fine,” replied
another. Scott v. Brown, crim. con. to be heard on or
before Wednesday next.—Barley thirty-two to forty-two.—Fine
upland meadow and rye grass hay, seventy
to eighty.—The last pocket of hops I sold brought
seven pounds fifteen shillings. Sussex bags six pounds
ten shillings.—There were only twenty-eight and a
quarter ships at market, “and coals are coals.” “Glad
to hear it, sir, for half the last you sent me were slates.”—”Best
qualities of beef four shillings and eightpence a
stone—mutton three shillings and eightpence, to four
shillings and sixpence.—He was exceedingly ill when
I paid my last visit—I gave him nearly a stone of
Epsom-salts, and bled him twice.—This horse would
suit you to a T, sir, but my skip-jack is coming out on
one at two o’clock that can carry a house.—See what a
bosom this one’s got.—Well, Gunter, old boy, have you
iced your horse to-day?—Have you heard that Brown
and Co. are in the Gazette? No, which Brown—not
John Brown? No, William Brown. What, Brown of
Goodman’s Fields? No, Brown of—— Street—Browne
with an e; you know the man I mean.—Oh, Lord, ay,
the man wot used to be called Nosey Browne.” A
general move ensued, and they left “the meet.”

“Vere be you going to turn out pray, sir, may I inquire?”
said a gentleman in green to the huntsman, as
he turned into a field. “Turn out,” said he, “why, ye
don’t suppose we be come calf-hunting, do ye? We
throws off some two stones’-throw from here, if so be
you mean what cover we are going to draw.” “No,”
said green-coat, “I mean where do you turn out the
stag?”—”D—n the stag, we know nothing about such
matters,” replied the huntsman. “Ware wheat! ware
wheat! ware wheat!” was now the general cry, as a
gentleman in nankeen pantaloons and Hessian boots
with long brass spurs, commenced a navigation across
a sprouting crop. “Ware wheat, ware wheat!” replied
he, considering it part of the ceremony of hunting, and
continued his forward course. “Come to my side,” said
Mr.——, to the whipper-in, “and meet that gentleman
as he arrives at yonder gate; and keep by him while
I scold you.”—”Now, sir, most particularly d—n you,
for riding slap-dash over the young wheat, you most
confounded insensible ignorant tinker, isn’t the headland
wide enough both for you and your horse, even if
your spurs were as long again as they are?” Shouts of
“Yooi over, over, over hounds—try for him—yoicks—wind
him! good dogs—yoicks! stir him up—have at
him there!”—here interrupted the jawbation, and the
whip rode off shaking his sides with laughter. “Your
horse has got a stone in each forefoot, and a thorn in
his near hock,” observed a dentist to a wholesale haberdasher
from Ludgate Hill, “allow me to extract them
for you—no pain, I assure—over before you know it.”
“Come away, hounds! come away!” was heard, and
presently the huntsman, with some of the pack at his
horse’s heels, issued from the wood playing Rule,
Britannia! on a key-bugle, while the cracks of heavy-thonged
whips warned the stragglers and loiterers to
follow. “Music hath charms to soothe the savage
beast,” observed Jorrocks, as he tucked the laps of
his frock over his thighs, “and I hope we shall find
before long, else that quarter of house-lamb will be
utterly ruined. Oh, dear, they are going below hill
I do believe! why we shall never get home to-day, and
I told Mrs. Jorrocks half-past five to a minute, and
I invited old Fleecy, who is a most punctual man.”

Jorrocks was right in his surmise. They arrived on
the summit of a range of steep hills commanding an
extensive view over the neighbouring country—almost,
he said, as far as the sea-coast. The huntsman and
hounds went down, but many of the field held a council
of war on the top. “Well! who’s going down?” said one.
“I shall wait for the next turn,” said Jorrocks, “for
my horse does not like collar work.” “I shall go this
time,” said another, “and the rest next.” “And so will
I,” said a third, “for mayhap there will be no second
turn.” “Ay,” added a fourth, “and he may go the other
way, and then where-shall we all be?” “Poh!” said
Jorrocks, “did you ever know a Surrey fox not take
to the hills?—If he does not, I’ll eat him without mint
sauce,” again harping on the quarter of lamb. Facilis
descensus Averni—two-thirds of the field went down,
leaving Jorrocks, two horse-dealers in scarlet, three
chicken-butchers, half a dozen swells in leathers, a whip,
and the Yorkshireman on the summit. “Why don’t
you go with the hounds?” inquired the latter of the
whip. “Oh, I wait here, sir,” said he, “to meet Tom
Hills as he comes up, and to give him a fresh horse.”
“And who is Tom Hills?” inquired the Yorkshireman.
“Oh, he’s our huntsman,” replied he; “you know Tom,
don’t you?” “Why, I can’t say I do, exactly,” said he;
“but tell me, is he called Hills because he rides up and
down these hills, or is that his real name?” “Hought!
you know as well as I do,” said he, quite indignantly,
“that Tom Hills is his name.”

The hounds, with the majority of the field, having
effected the descent of the hills, were now trotting on in
the valley below, sufficiently near, however, to allow
our hill party full view of their proceedings. After
drawing a couple of osier-beds blank, they assumed a
line parallel to the hills, and moved on to a wood of
about ten acres, the west end of which terminated in a
natural gorse. “They’ll find there to a certainty,” said
Mr. Jorrocks, pulling a telescope out of his breeches’
pocket, and adjusting the sight. “Never saw it blank
but once, and that was the werry day the commercial
panic of twenty-five commenced.—I remember making
an entry in my ledger when I got home to that effect.
Humph!” continued he, looking through the glass,
“they are through the wood, though, without a challenge.—Now,
my booys, push him out of the gorse! Let’s see
vot you’re made of.—There goes the first ‘ound in.—It’s
Galloper, I believe.—I can almost see the bag of
shot round his neck.—Now they all follow.—One—two—three—four—five—all
together, my beauties! Oh, vot
a sight! Peckham’s cap’s in the air, and it’s a find, by
heavens!” Mr. Jorrocks is right.—The southerly wind
wafts up the fading notes of the “Huntsman’s Chorus”
in Der Frieschutz and confirms the fact.—Jorrocks is
in ecstasies.—”Now,” said he, clawing up his breeches
(for he dispenses with the article of braces when out
hunting), “that’s what I calls fine. Oh, beautiful!
beautiful!—Now, follow me if you please, and if yon
gentleman in drab does not shoot the fox, he will be
on the hills before long.” Away they scampered along
the top of the ridge, with a complete view of the operations
below. At length Jorrocks stopped, and pulling the
telescope out, began making an observation. “There he
is, at last,” cried he, “just crossed the corner of yon
green field—now he creeps through the hedge by the
fir-tree, and is in the fallow one. Yet, stay—that’s no
fox—it’s a hare: and yet Tom Hills makes straight for
the spot—and did you hear that loud tally-ho? Oh!
gentlemen, gentlemen, we shall be laughed to scorn—what
can they be doing—see, they take up the scent,
and the whole pack have joined in chorus. Great
heavens, it’s no more a fox than I am!—No more brush
than a badger! Oh, dear! oh, dear! that I should live
to see my old friends, the Surrey fox’ounds, ‘unt hare,
and that too in the presence of a stranger.” The animal
made direct for the hills—whatever it was, the hounds
were on good terms with it, and got away in good form.
The sight was splendid—all the field got well off, nor
between the cover and the hills was there sufficient
space for tailing. A little elderly gentleman, in a pepper-and-salt
coat, led the way gallantly—then came the
scarlets—then the darks—and then the fustian-clad
countrymen. Jorrocks was in a shocking state, and
rolled along the hill-tops, almost frantic. The field
reached the bottom, and the foremost commenced the
steep ascent.

“Oh, Tom Hills!—Tom Hills!—’what are you at?
what are you after?'” demanded Jorrocks, as he landed
on the top. “Here’s a gentleman come all the way from
the north-east side of the town of Boroughbridge, in
the county of York, to see our excellent ‘ounds, and
here you are running a hare. Oh, Tom Hills! Tom Hills!
ride forward, ride forward, and whip them off, ere we
eternally disgrace ourselves.” “Oh,” says Tom, laughing,
“he’s a fox! but he’s so tarnation frightened of our
hounds, that his brush dropped off through very fear,
as soon as ever he heard us go into the wood; if you go
back, you’ll find it somewhere, Mr. Jorrocks; haw, haw,
haw! No fox indeed!” said he.—”Forrard, hounds,
forrard!” And away he went—caught the old whipper-in,
dismounted him in a twinkling, and was on a fresh
horse with his hounds in full cry. The line of flight was
still along the hill-tops, and all eagerly pressed on,
making a goodly rattle over the beds of flints. A check
ensued. “The guard on yonder nasty Brighton coach
has frightened him with his horn,” said Tom; “now
we must make a cast up to yonder garden, and see if
he’s taken shelter among the geraniums in the green-house.
As little damage as possible, gentlemen, if you
please, in riding through the nursery grounds. Now,
hold hard, sir—pray do—there’s no occasion for you
to break the kale pots; he can’t be under them. Ah,
yonder he goes, the tailless beggar; did you see him as
he stole past the corner out of the early-cabbage bed?
Now bring on the hounds, and let us press him towards
London.”

“See the conquering hero comes”, sounded through
the avenue of elms as Tom dashed forward with the
merry, merry pack. “I shall stay on the hills”, said one,
“and be ready for him as he comes back; I took a good
deal of the shine out of my horse in coming up this time”.
“I think I will do the same”, said two or three more.
“Let’s be doing”, said Jorrocks, ramming his spurs
into his nag to seduce him into a gallop, who after
sending his heels in the air a few times in token of his
disapprobation of such treatment, at last put himself
into a round-rolling sort of canter, which Jorrocks kept
up by dint of spurring and dropping his great bastinaderer
of a whip every now and then across his shoulders.
Away they go pounding together!

The line lies over flint fallows occasionally diversified
with a turnip-field or market-garden, and every now and
then a “willa” appears, from which emerge footmen in
jackets, and in yellow, red and green plush breeches,
with no end of admiring housemaids, governesses, and
nurses with children in their arms.

Great was the emulation when any of these were
approached, and the rasping sportsmen rushed eagerly
to the “fore.” At last they approach “Miss Birchwell’s
finishing and polishing seminary for young ladies,”
whose great flaring blue-and-gold sign, reflecting the
noonday rays of the sun, had frightened the fox and
caused him to alter his line and take away to the west.
A momentary check ensued, but all the amateur huntsmen
being blown, Tom, who is well up with his hounds,
makes a quick cast round the house, and hits off the
scent like a workman. A private road and a line of
gates through fields now greet the eyes of our
M’Adamisers. A young gentleman on a hired hunter
very nattily attired, here singles himself out and takes
place next to Tom, throwing the pebbles and dirt back
in the eyes of the field. Tom crams away, throwing the
gates open as he goes, and our young gentleman very
coolly passes through, without a touch, letting them
bang-to behind him. The Yorkshireman, who had been
gradually creeping up, until he has got the third place,
having opened two or three, and seeing another likely
to close for want of a push, cries out to our friend as
he approaches, “Put out your hand, sir!” The gentleman
obediently extends his limb like the arm of a
telegraph, and rides over half the next field with his
hand in the air! The gate, of course, falls to.

A stopper appears—a gate locked and spiked, with a
downward hinge to prevent its being lifted. To the right
is a rail, and a ha-ha beyond it—to the left a quick
fence. Tom glances at both, but turns short, and backing
his horse, rides at the rail. The Yorkshireman follows,
but Jorrocks, who espies a weak place in the fence a few
yards from the gate, turns short, and jumping off,
prepares to lead over. It is an old gap, and the farmer
has placed a sheep hurdle on the far side. Just as
Jorrocks has pulled that out, his horse, who is a bit of
a rusher, and has got his “monkey” completely up,
pushes forward while his master is yet stooping—and
hitting him in the rear, knocks him clean through the
fence, head foremost into a squire-trap beyond!—”Non
redolet sed olet!” exclaims the Yorkshireman,
who dismounts in a twinkling, lending his friend a
hand out of the unsavoury cesspool.—”That’s what
comes of hunting in a new¹² saddle, you see,” added
he, holding his nose. Jorrocks scrambles upon “terra
firma” and exhibits such a spectacle as provokes the
shouts of the field. He has lost his wig, his hat hangs
to his back, and one side of his person and face is completely
japanned with black odoriferous mixture. “My
vig!” exclaims he, spitting and spluttering, “but that’s
the nastiest hole I ever was in—Fleet Ditch is lavender-water
compared to it! Hooi yonder!” hailing a lad,
“Catch my ‘oss, boouy!” Tom Hills has him; and
Jorrocks, pocketing his wig, remounts, rams his spurs
into the nag, and again tackles with the pack, which had
come to a momentary check on the Eden Bridge road.
The fox has been headed by a party of gipsies, and,
changing his point, bends southward and again reaches
the hills, along which some score of horsemen have
planted themselves in the likeliest places to head him.
Reynard, however, is too deep for them, and has stolen
down unperceived. Poor Jorrocks, what with the violent
exertion of riding, his fall, and the souvenir of the cesspool
that he still bears about him, pulls up fairly
exhausted. “Oh, dear,” says he, scraping the thick of
the filth off his coat with his whip, “I’m reglarly blown,
I earn’t go down with the ‘ounds this turn; but, my good
fellow,” turning to the Yorkshireman, who was helping
to purify him, “don’t let me stop you, go down by all
means, but mind, bear in mind the quarter of house-lamb—at
half-past five to a minute.”

Footnote 12: (return) There is a superstition among sportsmen that they are sure
to get a fall the first day they appear in anything new.

Many of the cits now gladly avail themselves of the
excuse of assisting Mr. Jorrocks to clean himself for
pulling up, but as soon as ever those that are going
below hill are out of sight and they have given him
two or three wipes, they advise him to let it “dry on,”
and immediately commence a different sort of amusement—each
man dives into his pocket and produces
the eatables.

Part of Jorrocks’s half-quartern loaf was bartered
with the captain of an East Indiaman for a slice of
buffalo-beef. The dentist exchanged some veal sandwiches
with a Jew for ham ones; a lawyer from the
Borough offered two slices of toast for a hard-boiled
egg; in fact there was a petty market “ouvert” held.
“Now, Tomkins, where’s the bottle?” demanded Jenkins.
“Vy, I thought you would bring it out to-day,”
replied he; “I brought it last time, you know.” “Take
a little of mine, sir,” said a gentleman, presenting a
leather-covered flask—”real Thomson and Fearon,
I assure you.” “I wish someone would fetch an ocean
of porter from the nearest public,” said another. “Take
a cigar, sir?” “No; I feel werry much obliged, but they
always make me womit.” “Is there any gentleman here
going to Halifax, who would like to make a third in a
new yellow barouche, with lavender-coloured wheels,
and pink lining?” inquired Mr.——, the coach-maker.
“Look at the hounds, gentlemen sportsmen, my noble
sportsmen!” bellowed out an Epsom Dorling’s correct—cardseller—and
turning their eyes in the direction in
which he was looking, our sportsmen saw them again
making for the hills. Pepper-and-salt first, and oh,
what a goodly tail was there!—three quarters of a
mile in length, at the least. Now up they come—the
“corps de reserve” again join, and again a party halt
upon the hills. Again Tom Hills exchanges horses; and
again the hounds go on in full cry. “I must be off,” said
a gentleman in balloon-like leathers to another tiger;
“we have just time to get back to town, and ride round
by the park before it is dark—much better than seeing
the end of this brute. Let us go”; and away they went
to canter through Hyde Park in their red coats. “I must
go and all,” said another gentleman; “my dinner will
be ready at five, and it is now three.” Jorrocks was
game; and forgetting the quarter of house-lamb, again
tackled with the pack. A smaller sweep sufficed this
time, and the hills were once more descended, Jorrocks
the first to lead the way. He well knew the fox was
sinking, and was determined to be in at the death.
Short running ensued—a check—the fox had lain down,
and they had overrun the scent. Now they were on him,
and Tom Hills’s who-whoop confirmed the whole.

“Ah! Tom Hills, Tom Hills!” exclaimed Jorrocks,
as the former took up the fox, “‘ow splendid, ‘ow truly
brilliant—by Jove, you deserve to be Lord Hill—oh,
had he but a brush that we might present it to this
gentleman from the north-east side of the town of
Boroughbridge, in the county of York, to show the
gallant doings of the men of Surrey!” “Ay,” said Tom,
“but Squire——’s keeper has been before us for it.”

“Now,” said a gentleman in a cap, to another in a
hat, “if you will ride up the hill and collect the money
there, I will do so below—half-a-crown, if you please,
sir—half-a-crown, if you please, sir.—Have I got your
half-a-crown, sir?”—”Here’s three shillings if you will
give me sixpence.” “Certainly, sir—certainly.” “We
have no time to spare,” said Jorrocks, looking at his
watch. “Good afternoon, gentlemen, good afternoon,”
muttering as he went, “a quarter of house-lamb at half-past
five—Mrs. Jorrocks werry punctual—old Fleecy
werry particular.” They cut across country to Croydon,
and as they approached the town, innumerable sportsmen
came flocking in from all quarters. “What sport have
you had?” inquired Jorrocks of a gentleman in scarlet;
“have you been with Jolliffe?” “No, with the staghounds;
three beautiful runs; took him once in a
millpond, once in a barn, and once in a brickfield—altogether
the finest day’s sport I ever saw in my life.”
“What have you done, Mr. J——?” “Oh, we have had
a most gallant thing; a brilliant run indeed—three hours
and twenty minutes without a check—over the finest
country imaginable.” “And who got the brush?”
inquired the stag-man. “Oh, it was a gallant run,”
said Jorrocks, “by far the finest I ever remember.”
“But did you kill?” demanded his friend. “Kill! to be
sure we did. When don’t the Surrey kill, I should like
to know?” “And who got his brush, did you say?”
“I can’t tell,” said he—”didn’t hear the gentleman’s
name.” “What sport has Mr. Meager had to-day?”
inquired he of a gentleman in trousers, who issued from
a side lane into the high road. “I have been with the
Sanderstead, sir—a very capital day’s sport—run five
hares and killed three. We should have killed four—only—we
didn’t.” “I don’t think Mr. Meager has done
anything to-day.” “Yes, he has,” said a gentleman,
who just joined with a hare buckled on in front of his
saddle, and his white cords all stained with blood; “we
killed this chap after an hour and forty-five minutes’
gallop; and accounted for another by losing her after
running upwards of-three-quarters of an hour.” “Well,
then, we have all had sport,” said Jorrocks, as he
spurred his horse into a trot, and made for Morton’s
stables—”and if the quarter of house-lamb is but right,
then indeed am I a happy man.”

III. SURREY SHOOTING: MR. JORROCKS
IN TROUBLE

Our readers are now becoming pretty familiar with our
principal hero, Mr. Jorrocks, and we hope he improves
on acquaintance. Our fox-hunting friends, we are sure,
will allow him to be an enthusiastic member of the
brotherhood, and though we do not profess to put him
in competition with Musters, Osbaldeston, or any of
those sort of men, we yet mean to say that had his
lot been cast in the country instead of behind a counter,
his keenness would have rendered him as conspicuous—if
not as scientific—as the best of them.

For a cockney sportsman, however, he is a very
excellent fellow—frank, hearty, open, generous, and
hospitable, and with the exception of riding up Fleet
Street one Saturday afternoon, with a cock-pheasant’s
tail sticking out of his red coat pocket, no one ever
saw him do a cock tail action in his life.

The circumstances attending that exhibition are
rather curious.—He had gone out as usual on a Saturday
to have a day with the Surrey, but on mounting his
hunter at Croydon, he felt the nag rather queer under
him, and thinking he might have been pricked in the
shoeing, he pulled up at the smith’s at Addington to
have his feet examined. This lost him five minutes, and
unfortunately when he got to the meet, he found that a
“travelling¹³ fox” had been tallied at the precise moment
of throwing off, with which the hounds had gone away
in their usual brilliant style, to the tune of “Blue bonnets
are over the border.” As may be supposed, he was in
a deuce of a rage; and his first impulse prompted him
to withdraw his subscription and be done with the hunt
altogether, and he trotted forward “on the line,” in the
hopes of catching them up to tell them so. In this he
was foiled, for after riding some distance, he overtook a
string of Smithfield horses journeying “foreign for
Evans,” whose imprints he had been taking for the
hoof-marks of the hunters. About noon he found himself
dull, melancholy, and disconsolate, before the sign
of the “Pig and Whistle,” on the Westerham road,
where, after wetting his own whistle with a pint of
half-and-half, he again journeyed onward, ruminating
on the uncertainty and mutability of all earthly affairs,
the comparative merits of stag-, fox-, and hare-hunting,
and the necessity of getting rid of the day somehow or
other in the country.

Footnote 13: (return) He might well be called a “travelling fox,” for it was said
he had just travelled down from Herring’s, in the New Road, by
the Bromley stage.

Suddenly his reverie was interrupted by the discharge
of a gun in the field adjoining the hedge along which he
was passing, and the boisterous whirring of a great cock-pheasant
over his head, which caused his horse to start
and stop short, and to nearly pitch Jorrocks over his
head. The bird was missed, but the sportsman’s dog
dashed after it, with all the eagerness of expectation,
regardless of the cracks of the whip—the “comes to
heel,” and “downs to charge” of the master. Jorrocks
pulled out his hunting telescope, and having marked the
bird down with the precision of a billiard-table keeper,
rode to the gate to acquaint the shooter with the fact,
when to his infinite amazement he discovered his friend,
Nosey Browne (late of “The Surrey”), who, since his
affairs had taken the unfortunate turn mentioned in
the last paper, had given up hunting and determined
to confine himself to shooting only. Nosey, however,
was no great performer, as may be inferred, when we
state that he had been in pursuit of the above-mentioned
cock-pheasant ever since daybreak, and after firing
thirteen shots at him had not yet touched a feather.

His dog was of the right sort—for Nosey at least—and
hope deferred had not made his heart sick; on the
contrary, he dashed after his bird for the thirteenth
time with all the eagerness he displayed on the first.
“Let me have a crack at him,” said Jorrocks to Nosey,
after their mutual salutations were over. “I know where
he is, and I think I can floor him.” Browne handed the
gun to Jorrocks, who, giving up his hunter in exchange,
strode off, and having marked his bird accurately, he
kicked him up out of a bit of furze, and knocked him
down as “dead as a door-nail.” By that pheasant’s tail
hangs the present one.

Now Nosey Browne and Jorrocks were old friends,
and Nosey’s affairs having gone crooked, why of course,
like most men in a similar situation, he was all the better
for it; and while his creditors were taking twopence-halfpenny
in the pound, he was taking his diversion on
his wife’s property, which a sagacious old father-in-law
had secured to the family in the event of such a contingency
as a failure happening; so knowing Jorrock’s
propensity for sports, and being desirous of chatting
over all his gallant doings with “The Surrey,” shortly
after the above-mentioned day he dispatched a “twopenny,”
offering him a day’s shooting on his property
in Surrey, adding, that he hoped he would dine with
him after. Jorrocks being invited himself, with a freedom
peculiar to fox-hunters, invited his friend the Yorkshireman,
and visiting his armoury, selected him a
regular shot-scatterer of a gun, capable of carrying ten
yards on every side.

At the appointed hour on the appointed morning, the
Yorkshireman appeared in Great Coram Street, where he
found Mr. Jorrocks in the parlour in the act of settling
himself into a new spruce green cut-away gambroon
butler’s pantry-jacket, with pockets equal to holding a
powder-flask each, his lower man being attired in tight
drab stocking-net pantaloons, and Hessian boots with
large tassels—a striking contrast to the fustian pocket-and-all-pocket
jackets marked with game-bag strap,
and shot-belt, and the weather-beaten many-coloured
breeches and gaiters, and hob-nail shoes, that compose
the equipment of a shooter in Yorkshire. Mr. Jorrocks
not keeping any “sporting dogs,” as the tax-papers
call them, had borrowed a fat house-dog—a cross
between a setter and a Dalmatian—of his friend
Mr. Evergreen the greengrocer, which he had seen
make a most undeniable point one morning in the
Copenhagen Fields at a flock of pigeons in a beetroot
garden. This valuable animal was now attached by a
trash-cord through a ring in his brass collar to a leg
of the sideboard, while a clean licked dish at his side,
showed that Jorrocks had been trying to attach him
to himself, by feeding him before starting.

“We’ll take a coach to the Castle”, said Jorrocks, “and
then get a go-cart or a cast somehow or other to
Streatham, for we shall have walking enough when we
get there. Browne is an excellent fellow, and will make
us range every acre of his estate over half a dozen times
before we give in”. A coach was speedily summoned,
into which Jorrocks, the dog Pompey, the Yorkshireman,
and the guns were speedily placed, and away
they drove to the “Elephant and Castle.”

There were short stages about for every possible
place except Streatham. Greenwich, Deptford, Blackheath,
Eltham, Bromley, Footscray, Beckenham, Lewisham—all
places but the right. However, there were
abundance of “go-carts,” a species of vehicle that ply
in the outskirts of the metropolis, and which, like the
watering-place “fly,” take their name from the contrary—in
fact, a sort of lucus a non lucendo. They are
carts on springs, drawn by one horse (with curtains to
protect the company from the weather), the drivers of
which, partly by cheating, and partly by picking
pockets, eke out a comfortable existence, and are the
most lawless set of rascals under the sun. Their arrival
at the “Elephant and Castle” was a signal for a general
muster of the fraternity, who, seeing the guns, were
convinced that their journey was only what they call
“a few miles down the road,” and they were speedily
surrounded by twenty or thirty of them, all with
“excellent ‘osses, vot vould take their honours fourteen
miles an hour.” All men of business are aware of the
advantages of competition, and no one more so than
Jorrocks, who stood listening to their offers with the
utmost sang-froid, until he closed with one to take them
to Streatham Church for two shillings, and deliver them
within the half-hour, which was a signal for all the rest
to set-to and abuse them, their coachman, and his horse,
which they swore had been carrying “stiff-uns” ¹⁴ all
night, and “could not go not none at all”. Nor were
they far wrong; for the horse, after scrambling a hundred
yards or two, gradually relaxed into something between
a walk and a trot, while the driver kept soliciting every
passer-by to “ride,” much to our sportsmen’s chagrin,
who conceived they were to have the “go” all to themselves.
Remonstrance was vain, and he crammed in a
master chimney-sweep, Major Ballenger the licensed
dealer in tea, coffee, tobacco, and snuff, of Streatham
(a customer of Jorrocks), and a wet-nurse; and took up
an Italian organ-grinder to ride beside himself on the
front, before they had accomplished Brixton Hill.
Jorrocks swore most lustily that he would fine him, and
at every fresh assurance, the driver offered a passer-by
a seat; but having enlisted Major Ballenger into their
cause, they at length made a stand, which, unfortunately
for them, was more than the horse could do, for just as
he was showing off, as he thought, with a bit of a trot,
down they all soused in the mud. Great was the scramble;
guns, barrel-organ, Pompey, Jorrocks, driver, master
chimney-sweep, Major Ballenger, were all down together,
while the wet-nurse, who sat at the end nearest the door,
was chucked clean over the hedge into a dry ditch. This
was a signal to quit the vessel, and having extricated
themselves the best way they could, they all set off on
foot, and left the driver to right himself at his leisure.

Footnote 14: (return) Doing a bit of resurrection work.

Ballenger looked rather queer when he heard they
were going to Nosey Browne’s, for it so happened that
Nosey had managed to walk into his books for groceries
and kitchen-stuff to the tune of fourteen pounds, a large
sum to a man in a small way of business; and to be
entertaining friends so soon after his composition,
seemed curious to Ballenger’s uninitiated suburban
mind.

Crossing Streatham Common, a short turn to the left
by some yew-trees leads, by a near cut across the fields,
to Browne’s house; a fiery-red brick castellated cottage,
standing on the slope of a gentle eminence, and combining
almost every absurdity a cockney imagination
can be capable of. Nosey, who was his own “Nash,”
set out with the intention of making it a castle and
nothing but a castle, and accordingly the windows were
made in the loophole fashion, and the door occupied a
third of the whole frontage. The inconveniences of the
arrangements were soon felt, for while the light was
almost excluded from the rooms, “rude Boreas” had
the complete run of the castle whenever the door was
opened. To remedy this, Nosey increased the one and
curtailed the other, and the Gothic oak-painted windows
and door flew from their positions to make way for
modern plate-glass in rich pea-green casements, and a
door of similar hue. The battlements, however, remained,
and two wooden guns guarded a brace of chimney-pots
and commanded the wings of the castle, one whereof
was formed into a green-, the other into a gig-house.

The peals of a bright brass-handled bell at a garden-gate,
surmounted by a holly-bush with the top cut into
the shape of a fox, announced their arrival to the inhabitants
of “Rosalinda Castle,” and on entering they
discovered young Nosey in the act of bobbing for
goldfish, in a pond about the size of a soup-basin; while
Nosey senior, a fat, stupid-looking fellow, with a large
corporation and a bottle nose, attired in a single-breasted
green cloth coat, buff waistcoat, with drab
shorts and continuations, was reposing, sub tegmine fagi,
in a sort of tea-garden arbour, overlooking a dung-heap,
waiting their arrival to commence an attack upon the
sparrows which were regaling thereon. At one end of
the garden was a sort of temple, composed of oyster-shells,
containing a couple of carrier-pigeons, with which
Nosey had intended making his fortune, by the early
information to be acquired by them: but “there is many
a slip,” as Jorrocks would say.

Greetings being over, and Jorrocks having paid a
visit to the larder, and made up a stock of provisions
equal to a journey through the Wilderness, they
adjourned to the yard to get the other dog, and the
man to carry the game—or rather, the prog, for the
former was but problematical. He was a character, a sort
of chap of all work, one, in short, “who has no objection
to make himself generally useful”; but if his genius
had any decided bent, it was, perhaps, an inclination
towards sporting.

Having to act the part of groom and gamekeeper
during the morning, and butler and footman in the
afternoon, he was attired in a sort of composition dress,
savouring of the different characters performed. He
had on an old white hat, a groom’s fustian stable-coat
cut down into a shooting-jacket, with a whistle at the
button-hole, red plush smalls, and top-boots.

There is nothing a cockney delights in more than
aping a country gentleman, and Browne fancied himself
no bad hand at it; indeed, since his London occupation
was gone, he looked upon himself as a country gentleman
in fact. “Vell, Joe,” said he, striddling and sticking his
thumbs into the arm-holes of his waistcoat, to this
invaluable man of all work, “we must show the gemmem
some sport to-day; vich do you think the best line to
start upon—shall we go to the ten hacre field, or the
plantation, or Thompson’s stubble, or Timms’s turnips,
or my meadow, or vere?” “Vy, I doesn’t know,” said
Joe; “there’s that old hen-pheasant as we calls Drab
Bess, vot has haunted the plantin’ these two seasons,
and none of us ever could ‘it (hit), and I hears that
Jack, and Tom, and Bob, are still left out of Thompson’s
covey; but, my eyes! they’re ‘special vild!” “Vot, only
three left? where is old Tom, and the old ramping
hen?” inquired Browne. “Oh, Mr. Smith, and a party
of them ‘ere Bankside chaps, com’d down last Saturday’s
gone a week, and rattled nine-and-twenty shots at the
covey, and got the two old ‘uns; at least it’s supposed
they were both killed, though the seven on ’em only
bagged one bird; but I heard they got a goose or two
as they vent home. They had a shot at old Tom, the
hare, too, but he is still alive; at least I pricked him
yesterday morn across the path into the turnip-field.
Suppose we goes at him first?”

The estate, like the game, was rather deficient in
quantity, but Browne was a wise man and made the
most of what he had, and when he used to talk about
his “manor” on ‘Change, people thought he had at
least a thousand acres—the extent a cockney generally
advertises for, when he wants to take a shooting-place.
The following is a sketch of what he had: The east, as
far as the eye could reach, was bounded by Norwood,
a name dear to cockneys, and the scene of many a
furtive kiss; the hereditaments and premises belonging
to Isaac Cheatum, Esq. ran parallel with it on the west,
containing sixty-three acres, “be the same more or
less,” separated from which, by a small brook or runner
of water, came the estate of Mr. Timms, consisting of
sixty acres, three roods, and twenty-four perches, commonly
called or known by the name of Fordham; next
to it were two allotments in right of common, for all
manner of cattle, except cows, upon Streatham Common,
from whence up to Rosalinda Castle, on the west, lay
the estate of Mr. Browne, consisting of fifty acres and
two perches. Now it so happened that Browne had
formerly the permission to sport all the way up to Norwood,
a distance of a mile and a half, and consequently
he might have been said to have the right of shooting
in Norwood itself, for the keepers only direct their
attention to the preservation of the timber and the
morals of the visitors; but since his composition with
his creditors, Mr. Cheatum, who had “gone to the
wall” himself in former years, was so scandalised at
Browne doing the same, that no sooner did his name
appear in the Gazette, than Cheatum withdrew his
permission, thereby cutting him off from Norwood and
stopping him in pursuit of his game.

Joe’s proposition being duly seconded, Mr. Jorrocks,
in the most orthodox manner, flushed off his old flint
and steel fire-engine, and proceeded to give it an uncommon
good loading. The Yorkshireman, with a look
of disgust, mingled with despair, and a glance at Joe’s
plush breeches and top-boots, did the same, while
Nosey, in the most considerate sportsmanlike manner,
merely shouldered a stick, in order that there might be
no delicacy with his visitors, as to who should shoot
first—a piece of etiquette that aids the escape of many
a bird in the neighbourhood of London.

Old Tom—a most unfortunate old hare, that what
with the harriers, the shooters, the snarers, and one
thing and another, never knew a moment’s peace, and
who must have started in the world with as many lives
as a cat—being doomed to receive the first crack on
this occasion, our sportsmen stole gently down the fallow,
at the bottom of which were the turnips, wherein he was
said to repose; but scarcely had they reached the
hurdles which divided the field, before he was seen
legging it away clean out of shot. Jorrocks, who had
brought his gun to bear upon him, could scarcely
refrain from letting drive, but thinking to come upon
him again by stealth, as he made his circuit for Norwood,
he strode away across the allotments and Fordham estate,
and took up a position behind a shed which stood on
the confines of Mr. Timms’s and Mr. Cheatum’s properties.
Here, having procured a rest for his gun, he
waited until old Tom, who had tarried to nip a few
blades of green grass that came in his way, made his
appearance. Presently he came cantering along the
outside of the wood, at a careless, easy sort of pace,
betokening either perfect indifference for the world’s
mischief, or utter contempt of cockney sportsmen
altogether.

He was a melancholy, woe-begone-looking animal,
long and lean, with a slight inclination to grey on his
dingy old coat, one that looked as though he had
survived his kindred and had already lived beyond
his day. Jorrocks, however, saw him differently, and
his eyes glistened as he came within range of his gun.
A well-timed shot ends poor Tom’s miseries! He springs
into the air, and with a melancholy scream rolls neck
over heels. Knowing that Pompey would infallibly
spoil him if he got up first, Jorrocks, without waiting
to load, was in the act of starting off to pick him up,
when, at the first step, he found himself in the grasp
of a Herculean monster, something between a coal-heaver
and a gamekeeper, who had been secreted
behind the shed. Nosey Browne, who had been watching
his movements, holloaed out to Jorrocks to “hold hard,”
who stood motionless, on the spot from whence he fired,
and Browne was speedily alongside of him. “You are on
Squire Cheatum’s estate,” said the man; “and I have
authority to take up all poachers and persons found
unlawfully trespassing; what’s your name?” “He’s not
on Cheatum’s estate,” said Browne. “He is,” said the
man. “You’re a liar,” said Browne. “You’re another,”
said the man. And so they went on; for when such
gentlemen meet, compliments pass current. At length
the keeper pulled out a foot-rule, and keeping Jorrocks
in the same position he caught him, he set-to to measure
the distance of his foot from the boundary, taking off
in a line from the shed; when it certainly did appear
that the length of a big toe was across the mark, and
putting up his measure again, he insisted upon taking
Jorrocks before a magistrate for the trespass. Of course,
no objection could be made, and they all adjourned to
Mr. Boreem’s, when the whole case was laid before
him. To cut a long matter short—after hearing the
pros and cons, and referring to the Act of Parliament,
his worship decided that a trespass had been committed;
and though, he said, it went against the grain to do so,
he fined Jorrocks in the mitigated penalty of one
pound one.

This was a sad damper to our heroes, who returned to
the castle with their prog untouched and no great
appetite for dinner. Being only a family party, when
Mrs. B—— retired, the subject naturally turned upon
the morning’s mishap, and at every glass of port Jorrocks
waxed more valiant, until he swore he would appeal
against the “conwiction”; and remaining in the same
mind when he awoke the next morning, he took the
Temple in his way to St. Botolph Lane and had six-and-eightpence
worth with Mr. Capias the attorney,
who very judiciously argued each side of the question
without venturing an opinion, and proposed stating a
case for counsel to advise upon.

As usual, he gave one that would cut either way,
though if it had any tendency whatever it was to induce
Jorrocks to go on; and he not wanting much persuasion,
it will not surprise our readers to hear that Jorrocks,
Capias, and the Yorkshireman were seen a few days
after crossing Waterloo Bridge in a yellow post-chaise,
on their way to Croydon sessions.

After a “guinea” consultation at the “Greyhound,”
they adjourned to the court, which was excessively
crowded, Jorrocks being as popular with the farmers
and people as Cheatum was the reverse. Party feeling,
too, running rather high at the time, there had been a
strong “whip” among the magistrates to get a full
attendance to reverse Boreem’s conviction, who had
made himself rather obnoxious on the blue interest at
the election. Of course they all came in new hats,¹⁵ and
sat on the bench looking as wise as gentlemen judges
generally do.

Footnote 15: (return) Magistrates always buy their hats about session times, as
they have the privilege of keeping their hats on their blocks in
court.

One hundred and twenty-two affiliation cases (for
this was in the old Poor Law time) having been disposed
of, about one o’clock in the afternoon, the chairman,
Mr. Tomkins of Tomkins, moved the order of the day.
He was a perfect prototype of a county magistrate—with
a bald powdered head covered by a low-crowned,
broad-brimmed hat, hair terminating behind in a queue,
resting on the ample collar of a snuff-brown coat, with
a large bay-window of a corporation, with difficulty
retained by the joint efforts of a buff waistcoat, and the
waistband of a pair of yellow leather breeches. His
countenance, which was solemn and grave in the
extreme, might either be indicative of sense or what
often serves in the place of wisdom—when parties can
only hold their tongues—great natural stupidity. From
the judge’s seat, which he occupied in the centre of the
bench, he observed, with immense dignity, “There is
an appeal of Jorrocks against Cheatum, which we, the
bench of magistrates of our lord the king, will take if
the parties are ready,” and immediately the court rang
with “Jorrocks and Cheatum! Jorrocks and Cheatum!
Mr. Capias, attorney-at-law! Mr. Capias answer to his
name! Mr. Sharp attorney-at-law! Mr. Sharp’s in the
jury-room.—Then go fetch him directly,” from the
ushers and bailiffs of the court; for though Tomkins
of Tomkins was slow himself, he insisted upon others
being quick, and was a great hand at prating about
saving the time of the suitors. At length the bustle of
counsel crossing the table, parties coming in and others
leaving court, bailiffs shouting, and ushers responding,
gradually subsided into a whisper of, “That’s Jorrocks!
That’s Cheatum!” as the belligerent parties took their
places by their respective counsel. Silence having been
called and procured, Mr. Smirk, a goodish-looking man
for a lawyer, having deliberately unfolded his brief,
which his clerk had scored plentifully in the margin, to
make the attorney believe he had read it very attentively,
rose to address the court—a signal for half the
magistrates to pull their newspapers out of their pockets,
and the other half to settle themselves down for a nap,
all the sport being considered over when the affiliation
cases closed.

“I have the honour to appear on behalf of Mr. Jorrocks,”
said Mr. Smirk, “a gentleman of the very highest
consideration—a fox-hunter—a shooter—and a grocer.
In ordinary cases it might be necessary to prove the
party’s claim to respectability, but, in this instance,
I feel myself relieved from any such obligation, knowing,
as I do, that there is no one in this court, no one in
these realms—I might almost add, no one in this world—to
whom the fame of my most respectable, my most
distinguished, and much injured client is unknown. Not
to know JORROCKS is indeed to argue oneself unknown.”

“This is a case of no ordinary interest, and I approach
it with a deep sense of its importance, conscious of my
inability to do justice to the subject, and lamenting
that it has not been entrusted to abler hands. It is a
case involving the commercial and the sporting character
of a gentleman against whom the breath of
calumny has never yet been drawn—of a gentleman
who in all the relations of life, whether as a husband, a
fox-hunter, a shooter, or a grocer, has invariably preserved
that character and reputation, so valuable in
commercial life, so necessary in the sporting world, and
so indispensable to a man moving in general society.
Were I to look round London town in search of a bright
specimen of a man combining the upright, sterling
integrity of the honourable British merchant of former
days with the ardour of the English fox-hunter of
modern times, I would select my most respectable
client, Mr. Jorrocks. He is a man for youth to imitate
and revere! Conceive, then, the horror of a man of his
delicate sensibility—of his nervous dread of depreciation—being
compelled to appear here this day to
vindicate his character, nay more, his honour, from
one of the foulest attempts at conspiracy that was
ever directed against any individual. I say that a
grosser attack was never made upon the character of
any grocer, and I look confidently to the reversion of
this unjust, unprecedented conviction, and to the
triumphant victory of my most respectable and public-spirited
client. It is not for the sake of the few paltry
shillings that he appeals to this court—it is not for the
sake of calling in question the power of the constituted
authorities of this county—but it is for the vindication
and preservation of a character dear to all men, but
doubly dear to a grocer, and which once lost can never
be regained. Look, I say, upon my client as he sits
below the witness-box, and say, if in that countenance
there appears any indication of a lawless or rebellious
spirit; look, I say, if the milk of human kindness is not
strikingly portrayed in every feature, and truly may
I exclaim in the words of the poet:”

“I regret to be compelled to trespass upon the valuable
time of the court; but, sir, this appeal is based on a
trespass, and one good trespass deserves another.”

The learned gentleman then proceeded to detail the
proceedings of the day’s shooting, and afterwards to
analyse the enactments of the new Game Bill, which
he denounced as arbitrary, oppressive, and ridiculous,
and concluded a long and energetic speech, by calling
upon the court to reverse the decision of the magistrate,
and not support the preposterous position of fining a
man for a trespass committed by his toe.

After a few minutes had elapsed, Mr. Sergeant
Bumptious, a stiff, bull-headed little man, desperately
pitted with the smallpox, rose to reply, and looking
round the court, thus commenced:

“Five-and-thirty years have I passed in courts of
justice, but never, during a long and extensive practice,
have I witnessed so gross a perversion of that sublimest
gift, called eloquence, as within the last hour”—here
he banged his brief against the table, and looked at
Mr. Smirk, who smiled.—”I lament, sir, that it has not
been employed in a better cause—(bang again—and
another look). My learned friend has, indeed, laboured
to make the worse appear the better cause—to convert
into a trifle one of the most outrageous acts that ever
disgraced a human being or a civilised country. Well
did he describe the importance of this case!—important
as regards his client’s character—important as regards
this great and populous county—important as regards
those social ties by which society is held together—important
as regards a legislative enactment, and
important as regards the well-being and prosperity
of the whole nation—(bang, bang, bang). I admire
the bombastic eloquence with which my learned friend
introduced his most distinguished client—his most
delicate minded—sensitive client!—Truly, to hear him
speaking I should have thought he had been describing
a lovely, blushing young lady, but when he comes to
exhibit his paragon of perfection, and points out that
great, red-faced, coarse, vulgar-looking, lubberly lump
of humanity—(here Bumptious looked at Jorrocks as
he would eat him)—sitting below the witness-box,
and seeks to enlist the sympathies of your worships
on the Bench—of you, gentlemen, the high-minded,
shrewd, penetrating judges of this important cause—(and
Bumptious smiled and bowed along the Bench
upon all whose eyes he could catch)—on behalf of such
a monster of iniquity, it does make one blush for the
degradation of the British Bar—(bang—bang—bang—Jorrocks
here looked unutterable things). Does my
learned friend think by displaying his hero as a fox-hunter,
and extolling his prowess in the field, to gain
over the sporting magistrates on the Bench? He knows
little of the upright integrity—the uncompromising
honesty—the undeviating, inflexible impartiality that
pervades the breast of every member of this tribunal,
if he thinks for the sake of gain, fear, favour, hope,
or reward, to influence the opinion, much less turn
the judgment, of any one of them.” (Here Bumptious
bowed very low to them all and laid his hand upon
his heart. Tomkins nodded approbation.) “Far, far be
it from me to dwell with unbecoming asperity on the
conduct of anyone—we are all mortals—and alike liable
to err; but when I see a man who has been guilty of
an act which has brought him all but within the verge
of the prisoners’ dock; I say, when I see a man who has
been guilty of such an outrage on society as this ruffian
Jorrocks, come forward with the daring effrontery that
he has this day done, and claim redress where he himself
is the offender, it does create a feeling in my mind
divided between disgust and amazement”—(bang).

Here Jorrock’s cauldron boiled over, and rising from
his seat with an outstretched shoulder-of-mutton fist,
he bawled out, “D—n you, sir, what do you mean?”

The court was thrown into amazement, and even
Bumptious quailed before the fist of the mighty Jorrocks.
“I claim the protection of the court,” he exclaimed.
Mr. Tomkins interposed, and said he should certainly
order Mr. Jorrocks into custody if he repeated his
conduct, adding that it was “most disrespectful to the
justices of our lord the king.”

Bumptious paused a little to gather breath and a
fresh volume of venom wherewith to annihilate Jorrocks,
and catching his eye, he transfixed him like
a rattlesnake, and again resumed.

“How stands the case?” said he. “This cockney
grocer—for after all he is nothing else—who I dare
say scarcely knows a hawk from a hand-saw—leaves
his figs and raisins, and sets out on a marauding excursion
into the county of Surrey, and regardless of property—of
boundaries—of laws—of liberties—of life itself—strides
over every man’s land, letting drive at whatever
comes in his way! The hare he shot on this occasion was
a pet hare!—For three successive summers had Miss
Cheatum watched and fed it with all the interest and
anxiety of a parent. I leave it to you, gentlemen, who
have daughters of your own, with pets also, to picture
to yourselves the agony of her mind in finding that her
favourite had found its way down the throat of that
great guzzling, gormandising, cockney cormorant; and
then, forsooth, because he is fined for the outrageous
trespass, he comes here as the injured party, and
instructs his counsel to indulge in Billingsgate abuse
that would disgrace the mouth of an Old Bailey practitioner!
I regret that instead of the insignificant fine
imposed upon him, the law did not empower the worthy
magistrate to send him to the treadmill, there to recreate
himself for six or eight months, as a warning to the whole
fraternity of lawless vagabonds.” Here he nodded his
head at Jorrocks as much as to say, “I’ll trounce you,
my boy!” He then produced maps and plans of the
different estates, and a model of the shed, to show how
it had all happened, and after going through the case
in such a strain as would induce one to believe it was a
trial for murder or high treason, concluded as follows:

“The eyes of England are upon us—reverse this conviction,
and you let loose a rebel band upon the country,
ripe for treason, stratagem, or spoil—you overturn the
finest order of society in the world; henceforth no man’s
property will be safe, the laws will be disregarded, and
even the upright, talented, and independent magistracy
of England brought into contempt. But I feel convinced
that your decision will be far otherwise—that by
it you will teach these hot-headed—rebellious—radical
grocers that they cannot offend with impunity, and
show them that there is a law which reaches even the
lowest and meanest inhabitant of these realms, that
amid these days of anarchy and innovation you will
support the laws and aristocracy of this country, that
you will preserve to our children, and our children’s
children, those rights and blessings which a great and
enlightened administration have conferred upon ourselves,
and raise for Tomkins of Tomkins and the
magistracy of the proud county of Surrey, a name
resplendent in modern times and venerated to all
eternity.”

Here Bumptious cast a parting frown at Jorrocks,
and banging down his brief, tucked his gown under
his arm, turned on his heel and left the court, to indulge
in a glass of pale sherry and a sandwich, regardless
which way the verdict went, so long as he had given him
a good quilting. The silence that followed had the effect
of rousing some of the dozing justices, who nudging
those who had fallen asleep, they all began to stir
themselves, and having laid their heads together, during
which time they settled the dinner-hour for that day,
and the meets of the staghounds for the next fortnight,
they began to talk of the matter before the court.

“I vote for reversing,” said Squire Jolthead; “Jorrocks
is such a capital fellow.” “I must support Boreem,” said
Squire Hicks: “he gave me a turn when I made the mistaken
commitment of Gipsy Jack.” “What do you say,
Mr. Giles?” inquired Mr. Tomkins. “Oh, anything you
like, Mr. Tomkins.” “And you, Mr. Hopper?” who had
been asleep all the time. “Oh! guilty, I should say—three
months at the treadmill—privately whipped, if
you like,” was the reply. Mr. Petty always voted on
whichever side Bumptious was counsel—the learned
serjeant having married his sister—and four others
always followed the chair.

Tomkins then turned round, the magistrates resumed
their seats along the bench, and coming forward he stood
before the judge’s chair, and taking off his hat with
solemn dignity and precision, laid it down exactly in the
centre of the desk, amid cries from the bailiffs and ushers
for “Silence, while the justices of the peace of our
sovereign lord the king, deliver the judgment of the
court.”

“The appellant in this case,” said Mr. Tomkins, very
slowly, “seeks to set aside a conviction for trespass,
on the ground, as I understand, of his not having committed
one. The principal points of the case are admitted,
as also the fact of Mr. Jorrocks’s toe, or a part of his toe,
having intruded upon the respondent’s estate. Now, so
far as that point is concerned, it seems clear to myself
and to my brother magistrates, that it mattereth not
how much or how little of the toe was upon the land,
so long as any part thereof was there. ‘De minimis non
curat lex’—the English of which is ‘the law taketh no
cognisance of fractions’—is a maxim among the salaried
judges of the inferior courts in Westminster Hall, which
we the unpaid, the in-cor-rup-ti-ble magistrates of the
proud county of Surrey, have adopted in the very deep
and mature deliberation that preceded the formation
of our most solemn judgment. In the present great and
important case, we, the unpaid magistrates of our
sovereign lord the king, do not consider it necessary
that there should be ‘a toe, a whole toe, and nothing
but a toe,’ to constitute a trespass, any more than it
would be necessary in the case of an assault to prove
that the kick was given by the foot, the whole foot, and
nothing but the foot. If any part of the toe was there,
the law considers that it was there in toto. Upon this
doctrine, it is clear that Mr. Jorrocks was guilty of a
trespass, and the conviction must be affirmed. Before
I dismiss the case I must say a few words on the statute
under which this decision takes place.

“This is the first conviction that has taken place
since the passing of the Act, and will serve as a precedent
throughout all England. I congratulate the country
upon the efficacy of the tribunal to which it has been
submitted. The court has listened with great and becoming
attention to the arguments of the counsel on
both sides: and though one gentleman with a flippant
ignorance has denounced this new law as inferior to the
pre-existing system, and a curse to the country, we, the
magistrates of the proud county of Surrey, must enter
our protest against such a doctrine being promulgated.
Peradventure, you are all acquainted with my prowess
as a shooter; I won two silver tankards at the Red
House, Anno Domini 1815. I mention this to show that
I am a practical sportsman, and as to the theory of the
Game Laws, I derive my information from the same
source that you may all derive yours—from the bright
refulgent pages of the New Sporting Magazine!”

IV. MR. JORROCKS AND THE SURREY STAGHOUNDS

The Surrey foxhounds had closed their season—a most
brilliant one—but ere Mr. Jorrocks consigned his boots
and breeches to their summer slumber, he bethought of
having a look at the Surrey staghounds, a pack now
numbered among the things that were.

Of course he required a companion, were it only to
have some one to criticise the hounds with, so the
evening before the appointed day, as the Yorkshireman
was sitting in his old corner at the far end of the
Piazza Coffee-room in Covent Garden, having just finished
his second marrowbone and glass of white brandy,
George—the only waiter in the room with a name—came
smirking up with a card in his hand, saying, that
the gentleman was waiting outside to speak with him.
It was a printed one, but the large round hand in which
the address had been filled up, encroaching upon the
letters, had made the name somewhat difficult to decipher.
At length he puzzled out “Mr. John Jorrocks—Coram
Street”; the name of the city house or shop in
the corner (No.—, St. Botolph’s Lane) being struck
through with a pen. “Oh, ask him to walk in directly,”
said the Yorkshireman to George, who trotted off, and
presently the flapping of the doors in the passage announced
his approach, and honest Jorrocks came rolling
up the room—not like a fox-hunter, or any other sort of
hunter, but like an honest wholesale grocer, fresh from
the city.

“My dear fellow, I’m so glad to see you, you can’t
think,” said he, advancing with both hands out, and
hugging the Yorkshireman after the manner of a Polar
bear. “I have not time to stay one moment; I have to
meet Mr. Wiggins at the corner of Bloomsbury Square
at a quarter to six, and it wants now only seven minutes
to,” casting his eye up at the clock over the sideboard.—”I
have just called to say that as you are fond of
hunting, and all that sort of thing, if you have a mind
for a day with the staghounds to-morrow, I will mount
you same as before, and all that sort of thing—you understand,
eh?” “Thank you, my good friend,” said the
Yorkshireman; “I have nothing to do to-morrow, and
am your man for a stag-hunt.” “That’s right, my good
fellow,” said Jorrocks, “then I’ll tell you what do—come
and breakfast with me in Great Coram Street, at
half-past seven to a minute. I’ve got one of the first
‘ams (hams) you ever clapt eyes on in the whole course
of your memorable existence.—Saw the hog alive myself—sixteen
score within a pound; must come—know
you like a fork breakfast—dejeune à la fauchette, as we
say in France, eh? Like my Lord Mayor’s fool I guess,
love what’s good; well, all right too—so come without
any ceremony—us fox-hunters hates ceremony—where
there’s ceremony there’s no friendship.—Stay—I had
almost forgotten,” added he, checking himself as he
was on the point of departure. “When you come, ring
the area bell, and then Mrs. J—— won’t hear; know you
don’t like Mrs. J—— no more than myself.”

At the appointed hour the Yorkshireman reached
Great Coram Street, just as Old Jorrocks had opened
the door to look down the street for him. He was dressed
in a fine flowing, olive-green frock (made like a dressing-gown),
with a black velvet collar, having a gold embroidered
stag on each side, gilt stag-buttons, with rich
embossed edges; an acre of buff waistcoat, and a most
antediluvian pair of bright yellow-ochre buckskins,
made by White, of Tarporley, in the twenty-first year
of the reign of George the Third; they were double-lashed,
back-stiched, front-stiched, middle-stiched, and
patched at both knees, with a slit up behind. The coat
he had won in a bet, and the breeches in a raffle, the
latter being then second or third hand. His boots were
airing before the fire, consequently he displayed an
amplitude of calf in grey worsted stockings, while his
feet were thrust into green slippers. “So glad to see
you”! said he; “here’s a charming morning, indeed—regular
southerly wind and a cloudy sky—rare scenting
it will be—think I could almost run a stag myself. Come
in—never mind your hat, hang it anywhere, but don’t
make a noise. I stole away and left Mrs. J—— snoring, so
won’t do to wake her, you know. By the way, you should
see my hat;—Batsey, fatch my hat out of the back
parlour. I’ve set up a new green silk cord, with a gold
frog to fasten it to my button-hole—werry illigant, I
think, and werry suitable to the dress—quite my own
idea—have a notion all the Surrey chaps will get them;
for, between you and me, I set the fashions, and what
is more, I sometimes set them at a leap too. But now
tell me, have you any objection to breakfasting in the
kitchen?—more retired, you know, besides which you
get everything hot and hot, which is what I call doing
a bit of plisure.” “Not at all,” said the Yorkshireman,
“so lead the way”; and down they walked to the lower
regions.

It was a nice comfortable-looking place, with a blazing
fire, half the floor covered with an old oil-cloth, and the
rest exhibiting the cheerless aspect of the naked flags.
About a yard and a half from the fire was placed the
breakfast table; in the centre stood a magnificent uncut
ham, with a great quartern loaf on one side and a huge
Bologna sausage on the other; besides these there were
nine eggs, two pyramids of muffins, a great deal of toast,
a dozen ship-biscuits, and half a pork-pie, while a dozen
kidneys were spluttering on a spit before the fire, and
Betsy held a gridiron covered with mutton-chops on the
top; altogether there was as much as would have served
ten people. “Now, sit down,” said Jorrocks, “and let
us be doing, for I am as hungry as a hunter. Hope you
are peckish too; what shall I give you? tea or coffee?—but
take both—coffee first and tea after a bit. If I can’t
give you them good, don’t know who can. You must
pay your devours, as we say in France, to the ‘am, for
it is an especial fine one, and do take a few eggs with it;
there, I’ve not given you above a pound of ‘am, but you
can come again, you know—waste not want not.
Now take some muffins, do, pray. Batsey, bring some
more cream, and set the kidneys on the table, the Yorkshireman
is getting nothing to eat. Have a chop with
your kidney, werry luxterous—I could eat an elephant
stuffed with grenadiers, and wash them down with a
ocean of tea; but pray lay in to the breakfast, or I shall
think you don’t like it. There, now take some tea and
toast or one of those biscuits, or whatever you like;
would a little more ‘am be agreeable? Batsey, run into the
larder and see if your Missis left any of that cold chine
of pork last night—and hear, bring the cold goose, and
any cold flesh you can lay hands on, there are really
no wittles on the table. I am quite ashamed to set you
down to such a scanty fork breakfast; but this is what
comes of not being master of your own house. Hope your
hat may long cover your family: rely upon it, it is
cheaper to buy your bacon than to keep a pig”. Just
as Jorrocks uttered these last words the side door
opened, and without either “with your leave or by
your leave”, in bounced Mrs. Jorrocks in an elegant
dishabille (or “dish-of-veal”, as Jorrocks pronounced
it), with her hair tucked up in papers, and a pair of
worsted slippers on her feet, worked with roses and
blue lilies.

“Pray, Mister J——,” said she, taking no more notice
of the Yorkshireman than if he had been enveloped in
Jack the Giant-killer’s coat of darkness, “what is the
meaning of this card? I found it in your best coat pocket,
which you had on last night, and I do desire, sir, that
you will tell me how it came there. Good morning, sir
(spying the Yorkshireman at last), perhaps you know
where Mr. Jorrocks was last night, and perhaps you
can tell me who this person is whose card I have found
in the corner of Mr. Jorrocks’s best coat pocket?”
“Indeed, madam”, replied the Yorkshireman, “Mr.
Jorrocks’s movements of yesterday evening are quite
a secret to me. It is the night that he usually spends
at the Magpie and Stump, but whether he was there
or not I cannot pretend to say, not being a member of
the free and easy club. As for the card, madam…”
“There, then, take it and read it,” interrupted Mrs. J——;
and he took the card accordingly—a delicate pale pink,
with blue borders and gilt edge—and read—we would
fain put it all in dashes and asterisks—”Miss Juliana
Granville, John Street, Waterloo Road.”

This digression giving Mr. Jorrocks a moment or two
to recollect himself, he pretended to get into a thundering
passion, and seizing the card out of the Yorkshireman’s
hand, he thrust it into the fire, swearing it was an
application for admission into the Deaf and Dumb Institution,
where he wished he had Mrs. J——. The Yorkshireman,
seeing the probability of a breeze, pretended to
have forgotten something at the Piazza, and stole away,
begging Jorrocks to pick him up as he passed. Peace
had soon been restored; for the Yorkshireman had not
taken above three or four turns up and down the coffee-room,
ere George the waiter came to say that a gentleman
waited outside. Putting on his hat and taking a
coat over his arm, he turned out; when just before the
door he saw a man muffled up in a great military cloak,
and a glazed hat, endeavouring to back a nondescript
double-bodied carriage (with lofty mail box-seats and
red wheels), close to the pavement. “Who-ay, who-ay,”
said he, “who-ay, who-ay, horse!” at the same time
jerking at his mouth. As the Yorkshireman made his
exit, a pair eyes of gleamed through the small aperture
between the high cloak collar and the flipe of the glazed
hat, which he instantly recognised to belong to Jorrocks.
“Why, what the deuce is this you are in?” said he,
looking at the vehicle. “Jump up,” said Jorrocks, “and
I’ll tell you all about it,” which having done, and the
machine being set in motion he proceeded to relate
the manner in which he had exchanged his cruelty-van
for it—by the way, as arrant a bone-setter as ever
unfortunate got into, but which he, with the predilection
all men have for their own, pronounced to be a “monstrous
nice carriage.” On their turning off the rough
pavement on to the quiet smooth Macadamised road
leading to Waterloo Bridge, his dissertation was
interrupted by a loud horse-laugh raised by two or three
toll-takers and boys lounging about the gate.

“I say, Tom, twig this ‘ere machine,” said one. “Dash
my buttons, I never seed such a thing in all my life.”
“What’s to pay?” inquired Jorrocks, pulling up with
great dignity, their observations not having penetrated
the cloak collar which encircled his ears. “To pay!”
said the toll-taker—”vy, vot do ye call your consarn?”
“Why, a phaeton,” said Jorrocks. “My eyes! that’s a
good ‘un,” said another. “I say, Jim—he calls this ‘ere
thing a phe-a-ton!” “A phe-a-ton!—vy, it’s more like
a fire-engine,” said Jim. “Don’t be impertinent,” said
Jorrocks, who had pulled down his collar to hear what
he had to pay—”but tell me what’s to pay?” “Vy,
it’s a phe-a-ton drawn by von or more ‘orses,” said the
toll-taker; “and containing von or more asses,” said
Tom. “Sixpence-halfpenny, sir,” “You are a saucy
fellow,” said Jorrocks. “Thank ye, master, you’re
another,” said the toll-taker; “and now that you have
had your say, vot do ye ax for your mouth?” “I say,
sir, do you belong to the Phenix? Vy don’t you show
your badge?” “I say, Tom, that ‘ere fire-engine has been
painted by some house-painter, it’s never been in the
hands of no coach-maker. Do you shave by that ‘ere
glazed castor of yours?” “I’m blowed it I wouldn’t
get you a shilling a week to shove your face in sand,
to make moulds for brass knockers.” “Ay, get away!—make
haste, or the fire will be out,” bawled out
another, as Jorrocks whipped on, and rattled out of
hearing.

“Now, you see,” said he, resuming the thread of his
discourse, as if nothing had happened, “this back seat
turns down and makes a box, so that when Mrs. J——
goes to her mother’s at Tooting, she can take all her things
with her, instead of sending half of them by the coach
as she used to do; and if we are heavy, there is a pole
belonging to it, so that we can have two horses; and
then there is a seat draws out here (pulling a stool from
between his legs) which anybody can sit on.” “Yes,
anybody that is small enough,” said the Yorkshireman,
“but you would cut a queer figure on it, I reckon.”
The truth was, that the “fire-engine” was one of those
useless affairs built by some fool upon a plan of his own,
with the idea of combining every possible comfort and
advantage, and in reality not possessing one. Friend
Jorrocks had seen it at a second-hand shop in Fore
Street, and became the happy owner of it, in exchange
for the cruelty-van and seventeen pounds.—Their
appearance on the road created no small sensation,
and many were the jokes passed upon the “fire-engine.”
One said they were mountebanks; another that it was
a horse-break; a third asked if it was one of Gurney’s
steam-carriages, while a fourth swore it was a new convict-cart
going to Brixton. Jorrocks either did not or
would not hear their remarks, and kept expatiating
upon the different purposes to which the machine might
be converted, and the stoutness of the horse that was
drawing it.

As they approached the town of Croydon, he turned
his cloak over his legs in a very workman-like manner,
and was instantly hailed by some brother sportsmen;—one
complimented him on his looks, another on his
breeches, a third praised his horse, a fourth abused the
fire-engine, and a fifth inquired where he got his glazed
hat. He had an answer for them all, and a nod or a
wink for every pretty maid that showed at the windows;
for though past the grand climacteric, he still has a
spice of the devil in him—and, as he says, “there is no
harm in looking.” The “Red Lion” at Smitham Bottom
was the rendezvous of the day. It is a small inn on the
Brighton road, some three or four miles below Croydon.
On the left of the road stands the inn, on the right is a
small training-ground, and the country about is open
common and down. There was an immense muster
about the inn, and also on the training-ground, consisting
of horsemen, gig-men, post-chaise-men, footmen,—Jorrocks
and the Yorkshireman made the firemen.

“Here’s old Jorrocks, I do declare”, exclaimed one,
as Jorrocks drove the fire-engine up at as quick a pace
as his horse would go. “Why, what a concern he’s in”,
said another, “why, the old man’s mad, surely”.—”He’s
good for a subscription,” added another, addressing
him. “I say, Jorrocks, old boy, you’ll give us ten
pound for our hounds won’t you?—that’s a good fellow.”
“Oh yes, Jorrocks promised us a subscription last year,”
observed another, “and he is a man of his word—arn’t
you old leather breeches?” “No, gentlemen,” said
Jorrocks, standing up in the fire-engine, and sticking
the whip into its nest, “I really cannot—I wish I could,
but I really cannot afford it. Times really are so bad,
and I have my own pack to subscribe to, and I must
be ‘just before I am generous.'” “Oh, but ten pounds
is nothing in your way, you know, Jorrocks—adulterate
a chest of tea. Old——here will give you all the leaves
off his ash-trees.” “No,” said Jorrocks, “I really cannot—ten
pounds is ten pounds, and I must cut my coat
according to my cloth.” “By Jove, but you must have
had plenty of cloth when you cut that coat you’ve got
on, old boy. Why there’s as much cloth in the laps as
would make a pair of horse-sheets.” “Never mind,”
said Jorrocks, “I wear it, and not you.” “Now,” said
Jorrocks in an undertone to the Yorkshireman, “you
see what an unconscionable set of dogs these stag-‘unters
are. They’re at every man for a subscription, and talk
about guineas as if they grew upon gooseberry-bushes.
Besides, they are such a rubbishing set—all drafts from
the fox’ounds.—Now there’s a chap on a piebald just
by the trees—he goes into the Gazette reglarly once
in three years, and yet to see him out, you’d fancy all
the country round belonged to him. And there’s a buck
with his bearing-rein so tight that he can hardly move
his neck,” pointing to a gentleman in scarlet, with a
tremendous stiff blue cravat—”he lives by keeping a
mad-house and being werry high, consequential sort of
a cock, they calls him the ‘Lord High Keeper!’—I’ll
tell ye a joke about that fellow,” said he, pointing to
a man alighting from a red-wheeled buggy—”he’s a
werry shabby screw, and is always trying to save a
penny.—Well, he hires a young half-witted hawbuck
for a servant, who didn’t clean his boots to his liking,
so he began reading the Riot Act one day, and concluded
by saying, ‘I’m blowed if I couldn’t clean them better
myself with a little pump-water.’—The next day, up
came the boots duller than ever.—’Bless my soul,’
exclaimed he, ‘why, they are worse than before, how’s
this, sir?’—’Please, sir, you said you could clean them
better with a little pump-water, so I tried it, and I do
think they are worse!’ Haw! haw! haw!—Yon chap in
the black plush breeches and Hessians, standing by
the ginger-pop tray, is the only man what ever got the
better of me in the ‘oss-dealing line, and he certainlie
did bite me uncommon ‘andsomely. I gave him three
and twenty pounds, a strong violin case with patent
hinges, lined with superfine green baize, and an uncut
copy of Middleton’s Cicero, for an ‘oss that the blacksmith
really declared wasn’t worth shoeing.—Howsomever,
I paid him off, for I christened the ‘oss Barabbas—who,
you knows, was a robber—and the seller has
gone by the name of Barabbas ever since.”

“Well, but tell me, gentlemen, where do we dine?”
inquired Jorrocks, turning to a group who had just
approached the fire-engine. “We don’t know yet,” said
a gentleman in scarlet, “the deer has not come yet;
but yonder he is,” pointing up the road to a covered
cart, “and there are the hounds just coming over the
hill at the back.” The covered cart approached, and
several went to meet it. The cry of “Oh, it’s old Tunbridge,”
was soon heard. “Well, we shall have a good
dinner,” said Jorrocks, “if that is the case. Is it Tunbridge?”
inquired he eagerly of one of the party who
returned from the deer-cart. “Yes, it’s old Tunbridge,
and Snooks has ordered dinner at the Wells for sixteen
at five o’clock, so the first sixteen that get there had
better look out.” “Here, bouy,” said Jorrocks in an
undertone to his servant, who was leading his screws
about on the green, “take this ‘oss out of the carriage,
and give him a feed of corn, and then go on to Tunbridge
Wells, and tell Mr. Pegg, at the Sussex Arms,
that I shall be there with a friend to the dinner, and
bid him write ‘Jorrocks’ upon two plates and place
them together.—Nothing like making sure,” said he,
chuckling at his own acuteness.

“Now to ‘orse—to ‘orse!” exclaimed he, suiting the
action to the word, and climbing on to his great chestnut,
leaving the Yorkshireman to mount the rat-tail
brown. “Let’s have a look at the ‘ounds”, turning his
horse in the direction in which they were coming.
Jonathan Griffin¹⁶ took off his cap to Jorrocks, as he
approached, who waved his hand in the most patronising
manner possible, adding “How are you, Jonathan?”
“Pretty well, thank you, Mister Jorrocks, hope you’re
the same.” “No, not the same, for I’m werry well,
which makes all the difference—haw! haw! haw! You
seem to have but a shortish pack, I think—ten, twelve,
fourteen couple—’ow’s that? We always take nine and
twenty with the Surrey”. “Why, you see, Mister
Jorrocks, stag-hunting and fox-hunting are very
different. The scent of the deer is very ravishing, and
then we have no drawing for our game. Besides, at this
season, there are always bitches to put back—but we
have plenty of hounds for sport.—I suppose we may
be after turning out,” added Jonathan, looking at his
watch—”it’s past eleven.”

Footnote 16: (return) Poor Jonathan, one of the hardest riders and drinkers of his
day, exists, like his pack, but in the recollection of mankind. He
was long huntsman to the late Lord Derby, who, when he gave
up his staghounds, made Jonathan a present of them, and for
two or three seasons he scratched on in an indifferent sort of
way, until the hounds were sold to go abroad—to Hungary, we
believe.

On hearing this, a gentleman off with his glove and
began collecting, or capping, prior to turning out—it
being the rule of the hunt to make sure of the money
before starting, for fear of accidents. “Half a crown, if
you please, sir.” “Now I’ll take your half a crown.”
“Mr. Jorrocks, shall I trouble you for half a crown?”
“Oh, surely,” said Jorrocks, pulling out a handful of
great five-shilling pieces; “here’s for this gentleman and
myself,” handing one of them over, “and I shan’t even
ask you for discount for ready money.” The capping
went round, and a goodly sum was collected. Meanwhile
the deer-cart was drawn to the far side of a thick fence,
and the door being opened, a lubberly-looking animal,
as big as a donkey, blobbed out, and began feeding very
composedly. “That won’t do,” said Jonathan Griffin,
eyeing him—”ride on, Tom, and whip him away.” Off
went the whip, followed by a score of sportsmen whose
shouts, aided by the cracking of their whips, would have
frightened the devil himself; and these worthies, knowing
the hounds would catch them up in due time, resolved
themselves into a hunt for the present, and pursued
the animal themselves. Ten minutes having expired
and the hounds seeming likely to break away, Jonathan
thought it advisable to let them have their wicked will,
and accordingly they rushed off in full cry to the spot
where the deer had been uncarted. Of course, there was
no trouble in casting for the scent; indeed they were
very honest, and did not pretend to any mystery; the
hounds knew within an inch where it would be, and the
start was pretty much like that for a hunter’s plate
in four-mile heats. A few dashing blades rode before
the hounds at starting, but otherwise the field was
tolerably quiet, and was considerably diminished after
the three first leaps. The scent improved, as did the
pace, and presently they got into a lane along which
they rattled for five miles as hard as ever they could
lay legs to the ground, throwing the mud into each
other’s faces, until each man looked as if he was roughcast.
A Kentish wagon, drawn by six oxen, taking up
the whole of the lane, had obliged the dear animal to
take to the fields again, where, at the first fence, most
of our high-mettled racers stood still. In truth, it was
rather a nasty place, a yawning ditch, with a mud bank
and a rotten landing. “Now, who’s for it? Go it, Jorrocks,
you’re a fox-hunter,” said one, who, erecting himself in
his stirrups, was ogling the opposite side. “I don’t like
it,” said Jorrocks; “is never a gate near?” “Oh yes,
at the bottom of the field,” and away they all tore for it.
The hounds now had got out of sight, but were heard
running in cover at the bottom of the turnip-field into
which they had just passed, and also the clattering of
horses’ hoofs on the highway. The hounds came out
several times on to the road, evidently carrying the
scent, but as often threw up and returned into the cover.
The huntsman was puzzled at last; and quite convinced
that the deer was not in the wood, he called them out,
and proceeded to make a cast, followed by the majority
of the field. They trotted about at a brisk pace, first
to the right, then to the left, afterwards to the north,
and then to the south, over grass, fallow, turnips, potatoes,
and flints, through three farmyards, round two
horse-ponds, and at the back of a small village or hamlet,
without a note, save those of a few babblers. Everyone
seemed to consider it a desperate job. They were all
puzzled; at last they heard a terrible holloaing about a
quarter of a mile to the south, and immediately after
was espied a group of horsemen, galloping along the
road at full speed, in the centre of which was Jorrocks;
his green coat wide open, with the tails flying a long
way behind that of his horse, his right leg was thrust
out, down the side of which he kept applying his ponderous
hunting whip, making a most terrible clatter.
As they approached, he singled himself out from the
group, and was the first to reach the field. He immediately
burst out into one of his usual hunting energetic
strains. “Oh Jonathan Griffin! Jonathan Griffin!” said
he, “here’s a lamentable occurrence—a terrible disaster!
Oh dear, oh dear—we shall never get to Tunbridge—that
unfortunate deer has escaped us, and we shall
never see nothing more of him—rely upon it, he’s
killed before this.” “Why, how’s that?” inquired Griffin,
evidently in a terrible perturbation. “Why,” said
Jorrocks, slapping the whip down his leg again, “there’s
a little girl tells me, that as she was getting water at
the well just at the end of the wood, where we lost him,
she saw what she took to be a donkey jump into a return
post-chaise from the ‘Bell’, at Seven Oaks, that was
passing along the road with the door swinging wide
open! and you may rely upon it, it was the deer. The
landlord of the ‘Bell’ will have cut his throat before this,
for, you know, he vowed wengeance against us last year,
because his wife’s pony-chaise was upset, and he swore
that we did it.” “Oh, but that’s a bad job”, said the
huntsman; “what shall we do?” “Here, Tom,” calling
to the whipper-in, “jump on to the Hastings coach”
(which just came up), “and try if you can’t overtake
him, and bring him back, chaise and all, and I’ll follow
slowly with the hounds.” Tom was soon up, the coach
bowled on, and Jonathan and the hounds trotted gently
forward till they came to a public-house. Here, as they
stopped lamenting over their unhappy fate, and consoling
themselves with some cold sherry negus, the post-chaise
appeared in sight, with the deer’s head sticking
out of the side window with all the dignity of a Lord
Mayor. “Huzza! huzza! huzza!” exclaimed Jorrocks,
taking off his hat, “here’s old Tunbridge come back again,
huzza! huzza!” “But who’s to pay me for the po-chay,”
said the driver, pulling up; “I must be paid before I let
him out.” “How much?” says Jonathan. “Why,
eighteen-pence a mile, to be sure, and three-pence a
mile to the driver.” “No,” says Jorrocks, “that won’t do,
yours is a return chay; however, here’s five shillings for
you, and now, Jonathan, turn him out again—he’s
quite fresh after his ride—and see, he’s got some straw
in the bottom.”

Old Tunbridge was again turned out, with his head
towards the town from whence he took his name, and
after a quarter of an hour’s law, the pack was again laid
on. He was not, however, in very good wind, and it was
necessary to divide the second chase into two heats, for
which purpose the hounds were whipped off about the
middle, while the deer took a cold bath, after which he
was again set a-going. By half-past three they had
accomplished the run; and Mr. Pegg, of the “Sussex
Arms,” having mounted his Pegasus, found them at the
appointed place by the Medway, where old Tunbridge’s
carriage was waiting, into which having handed him,
they repaired to the inn, and at five o’clock eighteen of
them sat down to a dinner consisting of every delicacy
of the season, the Lord High Keeper in the chair. Being
all “hungry as hunters,” little conversation passed until
after the removal of the cloth, when after the King and
his Majesty’s Ministers had been drunk, the President
gave “The noble, manly sport of stag-hunting,” which
he eulogised as the most legitimate and exhilarating of
all sports, and sketched its progress from its wild state
of infancy when the unhappy sportsmen had to range
the fields and forests for their uncertain game, to the
present state of luxurious ease and elaborate refinement,
when they not only brought their deer to the meet, but
by selecting the proper animal, could insure a finish at
the place they most wished to dine at—all of which was
most enthusiastically applauded; and on the speaker’s
ending, “Stag-hunting,” and the “Surrey staghounds,”
and “Long life to all stag-hunters,” were drank in
brimming and overflowing bumpers. Fox-hunting, hare-hunting,
rabbit-hunting, cat-hunting, rat-catching,
badger-baiting—all wild, seasonable, and legitimate
sports followed; and the chairman having run through
his list, and thinking Jorrocks was getting rather mellow,
resolved to try the soothing system on him for a subscription,
the badgering of the morning not having
answered. Accordingly, he called on the company to
charge their glasses, as he would give them a bumper
toast, which he knew they would have great pleasure
in drinking.—”He wished to propose the health of his
excellent friend on his right—MR. JORROCKS (applause),
a gentleman whose name only required mentioning in
any society of hunters to insure it a hearty and enthusiastic
reception. He did not flatter his excellent friend
when he said he was a man for the imitation of all, and
he was sure that when the present company recollected
the liberal support he gave to the Surrey foxhounds,
together with the keenness with which he followed that
branch of amusement, they would duly appreciate, not
only the honour he had conferred upon them by his
presence in the field that morning, and at the table
that day, but the disinterested generosity which had
prompted him voluntarily to declare his intention of
contributing to the future support of the Surrey staghounds
(immense cheers). He therefore thought the
least they could do was to drink the health of Mr.
Jorrocks, and success to the Surrey foxhounds, with
three times three,” which was immediately responded
to with deafening cheers.

Old Jorrocks, after the noise had subsided, got on his
legs, and with one hand rattling the five-shilling pieces
in his breeches-pocket, and the thumb of the other
thrust into the arm-hole of his waistcoat, thus began
to address them.—”Gentlemen,” said he, “I’m no orator,
but I’m an honest man—(hiccup)—I feels werry (hiccup)
much obliged to my excellent friend the Lord High
Keeper (shouts of laughter), I begs his pardon—my
friend Mr. Juggins—for the werry flattering compliment
he has paid me in coupling my name (hiccup)
with the Surrey fox’ounds—a pack, I may say, without
wanity (hiccup), second to none. I’m a werry old member
of the ‘unt, and when I was a werry poor man (hiccup)
I always did my best to support them (hiccup), and
now that I’m a werry rich man (cheers) I shan’t do no
otherwise. About subscribing to the staggers, I doesn’t
recollect saying nothing whatsomever about it (hiccup),
but as I’m werry friendly to sporting in all its ramifications
(hiccup), I’ll be werry happy to give ten pounds
to your ‘ounds.”—Immense cheers followed this declaration,
which lasted for some seconds. When they had
subsided, Jorrocks put his finger on his nose and, with a
knowing wink of his eye, added: “Prowided my friend
the Lord High Keep—I begs his pardon—Juggins—will
give ten pounds to ours!”

V. THE TURF: MR. JORROCKS AT
NEWMARKET

“A muffin—and the Post, sir,” said George to the
Yorkshireman,—on one of the fine fresh mornings that
gently usher in the returning spring, and draw from the
town-pent cits sighs for the verdure of the fields,—as
he placed the above mentioned articles on his usual
breakfast table in the coffee-room of the “Piazza.”

With the calm deliberation of a man whose whole
day is unoccupied, the Yorkshireman sweetened his tea,
drew the muffin and a select dish of prawns to his elbow,
and turning sideways to the table, crossed his legs and
prepared to con the contents of the paper. The first
page as usual was full of advertisements.—Sales by
auction—Favour of your vote and interest—If the
next of kin—Reform your tailor’s bills—Law—- Articled
clerk—An absolute reversion—Pony phaeton—Artificial
teeth—Messrs. Tattersall—Brace of pointers—Dog
lost—Boy found—Great sacrifice—No advance in coffee—Matrimony—A
single gentleman—Board and lodging
in an airy situation—To omnibus proprietors—Steam
to Leith and Hull—Stationery—Desirable investment
for a small capital—The fire reviver or lighter.

Then turning it over, his eye ranged over a whole
meadow of type, consisting of the previous night’s debate,
followed on by City news, Police reports, Fashionable
arrivals and departures, Dinners given, Sporting
intelligence, Newmarket Craven meeting. “That’s more
in my way,” said the Yorkshireman to himself as he
laid down the paper and took a sip of his tea. “I’ve a
great mind to go, for I may just as well be at Newmarket
as here, having nothing particular to do in either
place. I came to stay a hundred pounds in London it’s
true, but if I stay ten of it at Newmarket, it’ll be all
the same, and I can go home from there just as well as
from here”; so saying, he took another turn at the tea.
The race list was a tempting one, Riddlesworth, Craven
Stakes, Column Stakes, Oatlands, Port, Claret, Sherry,
Madeira, and all other sorts. A good week’s racing in
fact, for the saintly sinners who frequent the Heath had
not then discovered any greater impropriety in travelling
on a Sunday, then in cheating each other on the Monday.
The tea was good, as were the prawns and eggs, and
George brought a second muffin, at the very moment
that the Yorkshireman had finished the last piece of
the first, so that by the time he had done his breakfast
and drawn on his boots, which were dryer and pleasanter
than the recent damp weather had allowed of their
being, he felt completely at peace with himself and all
the world, and putting on his hat, sallied forth with
the self-satisfied air of a man who had eat a good breakfast,
and yet not too much.

Newmarket was still uppermost in his mind, and as
he sauntered along in the direction of the Strand, it
occurred to him that perhaps Mr. Jorrocks might have
no objection to accompany him. On entering that great
thoroughfare of humanity, he turned to the east, and
having examined the contents of all the caricature shops
in the line, and paid threepence for a look at the York
Herald, in the Chapter Coffee-house, St. Paul’s Churchyard,
about noon he reached the corner of St. Botolph
Lane. Before Jorrocks & Co.’s warehouse, great bustle
and symptoms of brisk trade were visible. With true
city pride, the name on the door-post was in small dirty-white
letters, sufficiently obscure to render it apparent
that Mr. Jorrocks considered his house required no sign;
while, as a sort of contradiction, the covered errand-cart
before it, bore “JORROCKS & Co.’s WHOLESALE TEA
WAREHOUSE,” in great gilt letters on each side of the
cover, so large that “he who runs might read,” even
though the errand-cart were running too. Into this cart,
which was drawn by the celebrated rat-tail hunter, they
were pitching divers packages for town delivery, and a
couple of light porters nearly upset the Yorkshireman,
as they bustled out with their loads. The warehouse
itself gave evident proof of great antiquity. It was not
one of your fine, light, lofty, mahogany-countered,
banker-like establishments of modern times, where the
stock-in-trade often consists of books and empty canisters,
but a large, roomy, gloomy, dirty, dingy sort of
cellar above ground, full of hogsheads, casks, flasks,
sugar-loaves, jars, bags, bottles, and boxes.

The floor was half an inch thick, at least, with dirt,
and was sprinkled with rice, currants, and raisins, as
though they had been scattered for the purpose of growing.
A small corner seemed to have been cut off, like
the fold of a Leicestershire grazing-ground, and made
into an office in the centre of which was a square or
two of glass that commanded a view of the whole warehouse.
“Is Mr. Jorrocks in?” inquired the Yorkshireman
of a porter, who was busy digging currants with a
wooden spade. “Yes, sir, you’ll find him in the counting-house,”
was the answer; but on looking in, though
his hat and gloves were there, no Jorrocks was visible.
At the farther end of the warehouse a man in his shirt-sleeves,
with a white apron round his waist and a brown
paper cap on his head, was seen under a very melancholy-looking
skylight, holding his head over something,
as if his nose were bleeding. The Yorkshireman groped
his way up to him, and asking if Mr. Jorrocks was in,
found he was addressing the grocer himself. He had
been leaning over a large trayful of little white cups—with
teapots to match—trying the strength, flavour, and
virtue of a large purchase of tea, and the beverage was
all smoking before him. “My vig,” exclaimed he, holding
out his hand, “who’d have thought of seeing you
in the city, this is something unkimmon! However,
you’re werry welcome in St. Botolph Lane, and as this
is your first wisit, why, I’ll make you a present of some
tea—wot do you drink?—black or green, or perhaps
both—four pounds of one and two of t’other. Here,
Joe!” summoning his foreman, “put up four pounds
of that last lot of black that came in, and two pounds
of superior green, and this gentleman will tell you where
to leave it.—And when do you think of starting?”
again addressing the Yorkshireman—”egad this is fine
weather for the country—have half a mind to have a
jaunt myself—makes one quite young—feel as if I’d
laid full fifty years aside, and were again a boy—when
did you say you start?” “Why, I don’t know exactly,”
replied the Yorkshireman, “the weather’s so fine that
I’m half tempted to go round by Newmarket.” “Newmarket!”
exclaimed Jorrocks, throwing his arm in the
air, while his paper cap fell from his head with the
jerk—”by Newmarket! why, what in the name of all
that’s impure, have you to do at Newmarket?”

“Why, nothing in particular; only, when there’s
neither hunting nor shooting going on, what is a man
to do with himself?—I’m sure you’d despise me if I
were to go fishing.” “True,” observed Mr. Jorrocks
somewhat subdued, and jingling the silver in his
breeches-pocket. “Fox-‘unting is indeed the prince of
sports. The image of war, without its guilt, and only half
its danger. I confess that I’m a martyr to it—a perfect
wictim—no one knows wot I suffer from my ardour.—If
ever I’m wisited with the last infirmity of noble
minds, it will be caused by my ingovernable passion
for the chase. The sight of a saddle makes me sweat.
An ‘ound makes me perfectly wild. A red coat throws
me into a scarlet fever. Never throughout life have I
had a good night’s rest before an ‘unting morning. But
werry little racing does for me; Sadler’s Wells is well
enough of a fine summer evening—especially when they
plump the clown over head in the New River cut, and
the ponies don’t misbehave in the Circus,—but oh!
Newmarket’s a dreadful place, the werry name’s a
sickener. I used to hear a vast about it from poor Will
Softly of Friday Street. It was the ruin of him—and
wot a fine business his father left him, both wholesale
and retail, in the tripe and cow-heel line—all went in
two years, and he had nothing to show at the end of
that time for upwards of twenty thousand golden sovereigns,
but a hundredweight of children’s lamb’s-wool
socks, and warrants for thirteen hogsheads of damaged
sherry in the docks. No, take my adwice, and have
nothing to say to them—stay where you are, or, if
you’re short of swag, come to Great Coram Street,
where you shall have a bed, wear-and-tear for your teeth,
and all that sort of thing found you, and, if Saturday’s
a fine day, I’ll treat you with a jaunt to Margate.”

“You are a regular old trump,” said the Yorkshireman,
after listening attentively until Mr. Jorrocks had
exhausted himself, “but, you see, you’ve never been at
Newmarket, and the people have been hoaxing you about
it. I can assure you from personal experience that the
people there are quite as honest as those you meet every
day on ‘Change, besides which, there is nothing more
invigorating to the human frame—nothing more cheering
to the spirits, than the sight and air of Newmarket
Heath on a fine fresh spring morning like the present.
The wind seems to go by you at a racing pace, and the
blood canters up and down the veins with the finest
and freest action imaginable. A stranger to the race-course
would feel, and almost instinctively know, what
turf he was treading, and the purpose for which that
turf was intended”.

“Oh, I knows you are a most persuasive cock,” observed
Mr. Jorrocks interrupting the Yorkshireman, “and would
conwince the devil himself that black is white, but you’ll
never make me believe the Newmarket folks are honest,
and as to the fine hair (air) you talk of, there’s quite as
good to get on Hampstead Heath, and if it doesn’t make
the blood canter up and down your weins, you can
always amuse yourself by watching the donkeys cantering
up and down with the sweet little children—haw!
haw! haw!—But tell me what is there at Newmarket
that should take a man there?” “What is there?”
rejoined the Yorkshireman, “why, there’s everything
that makes life desirable and constitutes happiness, in
this world, except hunting. First there is the beautiful,
neat, clean town, with groups of booted professors,
ready for the rapidest march of intellect; then there
are the strings of clothed horses—the finest in the
world—passing indolently at intervals to their exercise,—the
flower of the English aristocracy residing in the
place. You leave the town and stroll to the wide open
heath, where all is brightness and space; the white
rails stand forth against the dear blue sky—the brushing
gallop ever and anon startles the ear and eye; crowds
of stable urchins, full of silent importance, stud the
heath; you feel elated and long to bound over the well
groomed turf and to try the speed of the careering
wind. All things at Newmarket train the mind to racing.
Life seems on the start, and dull indeed were he who
could rein in his feelings when such inspiring objects
meet together to madden them!”

“Bravo!” exclaimed Jorrocks, throwing his paper
cap in the air as the Yorkshireman concluded.—”Bravo!—werry
good indeed! You speak like ten Lord Mayors—never
heard nothing better. Dash my vig, if I won’t
go. By Jove, you’ve done it. Tell me one thing—is
there a good place to feed at?”

“Capital!” replied the Yorkshireman, “beef, mutton,
cheese, ham, all the delicacies of the season, as the
sailor said”; and thereupon the Yorkshireman and
Jorrocks shook hands upon the bargain.

Sunday night arrived, and with it arrived, at the
“Belle Sauvage,” in Ludgate Hill, Mr. Jorrocks’s boy
“Binjimin,” with Mr. Jorrocks’s carpet-bag; and shortly
after Mr. Jorrocks, on his chestnut hunter, and the
Yorkshireman, in a hack cab, entered the yard. Having
consigned his horse to Binjimin; after giving him a
very instructive lesson relative to the manner in which
he would chastise him if he heard of his trotting or playing
any tricks with the horse on his way home, Mr.
Jorrocks proceeded to pay the remainder of his fare in
the coach office. The mail was full inside and out, indeed
the book-keeper assured him he could have filled a
dozen more, so anxious ware all London to see the
Riddlesworth run. “Inside,” said he, “are you and your
friend, and if it wern’t that the night air might give
you cold, Mr. Jorrocks” (for all the book-keepers in
London know him), “I should have liked to have got
you outsides, and I tried to make an exchange with
two black-legs, but they would hear of nothing less
than two guineas a head, which wouldn’t do, you know.
Here comes another of your passengers—a great foreign
nobleman, they say—Baron something—though he looks
as much like a foreign pickpocket as anything else.”

“Vich be de voiture?” inquired a tall, gaunt-looking
foreigner, with immense moustache, a high conical hat
with a bright buckle, long, loose, blueish-blackish frock-coat,
very short white waistcoat, baggy brownish striped
trousers, and long-footed Wellington boots, with a sort
of Chinese turn up at the toe. “Vich be de Newmarket
Voiture?” said he, repeating the query, as he entered
the office and deposited a silk umbrella, a camlet cloak,
and a Swiss knapsack on the counter. The porter,
without any attempt at an answer, took his goods and
walked off to the mail, followed closely by the Baron,
and after depositing the cloak inside, so that the Baron
might ride with his “face to the horses,” as the saying
is, he turned the knapsack into the hind boot, and
swung himself into the office till it was time to ask for
something for his exertions. Meanwhile the Baron made
a tour of the yard, taking a lesson in English from the
lettering on the various coaches, when, on the hind boot
of one, he deciphered the word Cheapside.—”Ah, Cheapside!”
said he, pulling out his dictionary and turning to
the letter C. “Chaste, chat, chaw,—cheap, dat be it.
Cheap,—to be had at a low price—small value. Ah! I
hev (have) it,” said he, stamping and knitting his brows,
“sacré-e-e-e-e nom de Dieu,” and the first word being
drawn out to its usual longitude, three strides brought
him and the conclusion of the oath into the office together.
He then opened out upon the book-keeper, in a
tremendous volley of French, English and Hanoverian
oaths, for he was a cross between the first and last
named countries, the purport of which was “dat he
had paid de best price, and he be dem if he vod ride on
de Cheapside of de coach.” In vain the clerks and book-keepers
tried to convince him he was wrong in his
interpretation. With the full conviction of a foreigner that
he was about to be cheated, he had his cloak shifted to
the opposite side of the coach, and the knapsack placed
on the roof. The fourth inside having cast up, the outside
passengers mounted, the insides took their places,
three-pences and sixpences were pulled out for the
porters, the guard twanged his horn, the coachman
turned out his elbow, flourished his whip, caught the
point, cried “All right! sit tight!” and trotted out of
the yard.

Jorrocks and the Yorkshireman sat opposite each
other, the Baron and old Sam Spring, the betting man,
did likewise. Who doesn’t know old Sam, with his
curious tortoiseshell-rimmed spectacles, his old drab hat
turned up with green, careless neckcloth, flowing robe,
and comical cut? He knew Jorrocks—though—tell it
not in Coram Street, he didn’t know his name; but
concluded from the disparity of age between him and
his companion, that Jorrocks was either a shark or a
shark’s jackal, and the Yorkshireman a victim. With
due professional delicacy, he contented himself with
scrutinising the latter through his specs. The Baron’s
choler having subsided, he was the first to break the
ice of silence. “Foine noight,” was the observation,
which was thrown out promiscuously to see who would
take it up. Now Sam Spring, though he came late, had
learned from the porter that there was a Baron in the
coach, and being a great admirer of the nobility, for
whose use he has a code of signals of his own, consisting
of one finger to his hat for a Baron Lord as he calls
them, two for a Viscount, three for an Earl, four for a
Marquis, and the whole hand for a Duke, he immediately
responded with “Yes, my lord,” with a fore-finger to
his hat. There is something sweet in the word “Lord”
which finds its way home to the heart of an Englishman.
No sooner did Sam pronounce it, than the Baron became
transformed in Jorrocks’s eyes into a very superior sort
of person, and forthwith he commences ingratiating
himself by offering him a share of a large paper of sandwiches,
which the Baron accepted with the greatest
condescension, eating what he could and stuffing the
remainder into his hat. His lordship was a better hand
at eating than speaking, and the united efforts of the
party could not extract from him the precise purport
of his journey. Sam threw out two or three feasible
offers in the way of bets, but they fell still-born to
the bottom of the coach, and Jorrocks talked to him
about hunting and had the conversation all to himself,
the Baron merely replying with a bow and a stare,
sometimes diversified with, or “I tank you—vare good.”
The conversation by degrees resolved itself into a snore,
in which they were all indulging, when the raw morning
air rushed in among them, as a porter with a lanthorn
opened the door and announced their arrival at
Newmarket. Forthwith they turned into the street, and
the outside passengers having descended, they all commenced
straddling, yawning, and stretching their limbs
while the guard and porters sorted their luggage. The
Yorkshireman having an eye to a bed, speedily had
Mr. Jorrocks’s luggage and his own on the back of a
porter on its way to the “Rutland Arms,” while that
worthy citizen followed in a sort of sleepy astonishment
at the smallness of the place, inquiring if they
were sure they had not stopped at some village by
mistake. Two beds had been ordered for two gentlemen
who could not get two seats by the mail, which fell to
the lot of those who did, and into these our heroes
trundled, having arranged to be called by the early
exercising hour.

Whether it was from want of his usual night-cap of
brandy and water, or the fatigues of travelling, or what
else, remains unknown, but no sooner was Mr. Jorrocks
left alone with his candle, than all at once he was seized
with a sudden fit of trepidation, on thinking that he should
have been inveigled to such a place as Newmarket, and
the tremor increasing as he pulled four five-pound
bank-notes out of his watch-pocket, besides a vast of
silver and his great gold watch, he was resolved, should
an attempt be made upon his property, to defend it with
his life, and having squeezed the notes into the toe of
his boots, and hid the silver in the wash-hand stand,
he very deliberately put his watch and the poker under
the pillow, and set the heavy chest of drawers with two
stout chairs and a table against the door, after all which
exertions he got into bed and very soon fell sound asleep.

Most of the inmates of the house were up with the
lark to the early exercises, and the Yorkshireman was as
early as any of them. Having found Mr. Jorrocks’s door,
he commenced a loud battery against it without awaking
the grocer; he then tried to open it, but only succeeded
in getting it an inch or two from the post, and after
several holloas of “Jorrocks, my man! Mr. Jorrocks!
Jorrocks, old boy! holloa, Jorrocks!” he succeeded in
extracting the word “Wot?” from the worthy gentleman
as he rolled over in his bed. “Jorrocks!” repeated
the Yorkshireman, “it’s time to be up.” “Wot?” again
was the answer. “Time to get up. The morning’s breaking.”
“Let it break,” replied he, adding in a mutter,
as he turned over again, “it owes me nothing.”

Entreaties being useless, and a large party being on
the point of setting off, the Yorkshireman joined them,
and spent a couple of hours on the dew-bespangled
heath, during which time they not only criticised the
figure and action of every horse that was out, but got
up tremendous appetites for breakfast. In the meantime
Mr. Jorrocks had risen, and having attired himself
with his usual care, in a smart blue coat with metal
buttons, buff waistcoat, blue stocking-netted tights, and
Hessian boots, he turned into the main street of Newmarket,
where he was lost in astonishment at the insignificance
of the place. But wiser men than Mr.
Jorrocks have been similarly disappointed, for it enters
into the philosophy of few to conceive the fame and
grandeur of Newmarket compressed into the limits of
the petty, outlandish, Icelandish place that bears the
name. “Dash my vig,” said Mr. Jorrocks, as he brought
himself to bear upon Rogers’s shop-window, “this is
the werry meanest town I ever did see. Pray, sir,”
addressing himself to a groomish-looking man in a
brown cut-away coat, drab shorts and continuations,
who had just emerged from the shop with a race list
in his hand, “Pray, sir, be this your principal street?”
The man eyed him with a mixed look of incredulity and
contempt. At length, putting his thumbs into the arm-holes
of his waistcoat, he replied, “I bet a crown you
know as well as I do.” “Done,” said Mr. Jorrocks holding
out his hand. “No—I won’t do that,” replied the
man, “but I’ll tell you what I’ll do with you,—I’ll lay
you two to one, in fives or fifties if you like, that you
knew before you axed, and that Thunderbolt don’t win
the Riddlesworth.” “Really,” said Mr. Jorrocks, “I’m
not a betting man.” “Then, wot the ‘ell business have
you at Newmarket?” was all the answer he got. Disgusted
with such inhospitable impertinence, Mr. Jorrocks
turned on his heel and walked away. Before the “White
Hart” Inn was a smartish pony phaeton, in charge of
a stunted stable lad. “I say, young chap,” inquired
Jorrocks, “whose is that?” “How did you know that
I was a young chap?” inquired the abortion turning
round. “Guessed it,” replied Jorrocks, chuckling at his
own wit. “Then guess whose it is.”

“Pray, are your clocks here by London time?” he
asked of a respectable elderly-looking man whom he
saw turn out of the entry leading to the Kingston
rooms, and take the usual survey first up the town and
then down it, and afterwards compose his hands in his
breeches-pockets, there to stand to see the “world.” ¹⁷
“Come now, old ‘un—none o’ your tricks here—you’ve
got a match on against time, I suppose,” was all the
answer he could get after the man (old R—n the ex-flagellator)
had surveyed him from head to foot.

Footnote 17: (return) Newmarket or London—it’s all the same—”The world” is
but composed of one’s own acquaintance.

We need hardly say after all these rebuffs that when
Mr. Jorrocks met the Yorkshireman, he was not in the
best possible humour; indeed, to say nothing of the
extreme sharpness and suspicion of the people, we know
of no place where a man, not fond of racing, is so
completely out of his element as at Newmarket, for
with the exception of a little “elbow shaking” in the
evening, there is literally and truly nothing else to do.
It is “Heath,” “Ditch in,” “Abingdon mile,” “T.Y.C.
Stakes,” “Sweepstakes,” “Handicaps,” “Bet,” “Lay,”
“Take,” “Odds,” “Evens,” morning, noon and night.

Mr. Jorrocks made bitter complaints during the
breakfast, and some invidious comparisons between
racing men and fox-hunters, which, however, became
softer towards the close, as he got deeper in the delicacy
of a fine Cambridge brawn. Nature being at length
appeased, he again thought of turning out, to have a
look, as he said, at the shows on the course, but the
appearance of his friend the Baron opposite the window,
put it out of his head, and he sallied forth to join him.
The Baron was evidently incog.: for he had on the same
short dirty-white waistcoat, Chinese boots, and conical
hat, that he travelled down in, and being a stranger in
the land, of course he was uncommonly glad to pick
up Jorrocks, so after he had hugged him a little, called
him a “bon garçon,” and a few other endearing terms,
he run his great long arm through his, and walked him
down street, the whole peregrinations of Newmarket
being comprised in the words “up street” and “down.”
He then communicated in most unrepresentable language,
that he was on his way to buy “an ‘oss,” and
Jorrocks informing him that he was a perfect connoisseur
in the article, the Baron again assured him of
his distinguished consideration. They were met by Joe
Rogers the trainer with a ring-key in his hand, who led
the way to the stable, and having unlocked a box in
which was a fine slapping four-year old, according to
etiquette he put his hat in a corner, took a switch in
one hand, laid hold of the horse’s head with the other,
while the lad in attendance stripped off its clothes. The
Baron then turned up his wrists, and making a curious
noise in his throat, proceeded to pass his hand down
each leg, and along its back, after which he gave it a
thump in the belly and squeezed its throat, when, being
as wise as he was at starting, he stuck his thumb
in his side, and took a mental survey of the whole.—”Ah,”
said he at length—”foin ‘oss,—foin ‘oss; vot ears
he has?” “Oh,” said Rogers, “they show breeding.”
“Non, non, I say vot ears he has?” “Well, but he carries
them well,” was the answer. “Non, non,” stamping, “I
say vot ears (years) he has?” “Oh, hang it, I twig—four
years old.” Then the Baron took another long look
at him. At length he resumed, “I vill my wet.” “What’s
that?” inquired Rogers of Jorrocks. “His wet—why, a
drink to be sure,” and thereupon Rogers went to the
pump and brought a glass of pure water, which the
Baron refused with becoming indignation. “Non, non,”
said he stamping, “I vill my wet.” Rogers looked at
Jorrocks, and Jorrocks looked at Rogers, but neither
Rogers nor Jorrocks understood him. “I vill my wet,”
repeated the Baron with vehemence. “He must want
some brandy in it,” observed Mr. Jorrocks, judging of
the Baron by himself, and thereupon the lad was sent
for three-penn’orth. When it arrived, the Baron dashed
it out of his hand with a prolonged sacré-e-e-e—! adding
“I vill von wet-tin-nin-na-ary surgeon.” The boy was
dispatched for one, and on his arrival the veterinary
surgeon went through the process that the Baron had
attempted, and not being a man of many words, he
just gave the Baron a nod at the end. “How moch?”
inquked the Baron of Rogers. “Five hundred,” was the
answer. “Vot, five hundred livre?” “Oh d——n it, you
may take or leave him, just as you like, but you won’t
get him for less.” The “vet” explained that the Baron
wished to know whether it was five hundred francs
(French ten-pences), or five hundred guineas English
money, and being informed that it was the latter, he
gave his conical hat a thrust on his brow, and bolted
out of the box.

But race hour approaches, and people begin to
assemble in groups before the “rooms,” while tax-carts,
pony-gigs, post-chaises, the usual aristocratical
accompaniments of Newmarket, come dribbling at
intervals into the town. Here is old Sam Spring in a
spring-cart, driven by a ploughboy in fustian, there
the Earl of—— on a ten-pound pony, with the girths
elegantly parted to prevent the saddle slipping over
its head, while Miss——, his jockey’s daughter, dashes
by him in a phaeton with a powdered footman, and the
postilion in scarlet and leathers, with a badge on his
arm. Old Crockey puts on his greatcoat, Jem Bland
draws the yellow phaeton and greys to the gateway of
the “White Hart,” to take up his friend Crutch Robinson;
Zac, Jack and another, have just driven on in a fly.
In short, it’s a brilliant meeting! Besides four coronetted
carriages with post-horses, there are three phaetons-and-pair;
a thing that would have been a phaeton if they’d
have let it; General Grosvenor’s dog-carriage, that is to
say, his carriage with a dog upon it; Lady Chesterfield
and the Hon. Mrs. Anson in a pony phaeton with an
out-rider (Miss—— will have one next meeting instead
of the powdered footman); Tattersall in his double
carriage driving without bearing-reins; Old Theobald
in leather breeches and a buggy; five Bury butchers
in a tax-cart; Young Dutch Sam on a pony; “Short-odds
Richards” on a long-backed crocodile-looking
rosinante; and no end of pedestrians.

But where is Mr. Jorrocks all this time? Why eating
brawn in the “Rutland Arms” with his friend the Baron,
perfectly unconscious that all these passers-by were not
the daily visables of the place. “Dash my vig,” said he,
as he bolted another half of the round, “I see no
symptoms of a stir. Come, my lord, do me the honour
to take another glass of sherry.” His lordship was
nothing loath, so by mutual entreaties they finished
the bottle, besides a considerable quantity of porter.
A fine, fat, chestnut, long-tailed Suffolk punch cart
mare—fresh from the plough—having been considerately
provided by the Yorkshireman for Mr. Jorrocks,
with a cob for himself, they proceeded to mount in the
yard, when Mr. Jorrocks was concerned to find that
the Baron had nothing to carry him. His lordship, too,
seemed disconcerted, but it was only momentary; for
walking up to the punch mare, and resting his elbow
on her hind quarter to try if she kicked, he very coolly
vaulted up behind Mr. Jorrocks. Now Jorrocks, though
proud of the patronage of a lord, did not exactly comprehend
whether he was in earnest or not, but the
Baron soon let him know; for thrusting his conical
hat on his brow, he put his arm round Jorrocks’s waist,
and gave the old mare a touch in the flank with the
Chinese boot, crying out—”Along me, brave garçon,
along ma cher,” and the owner of the mare living at
Kentford, she went off at a brisk trot in that direction,
while the Yorkshireman slipped down the town unperceived.
The sherry had done its business on them both;
the Baron, and who, perhaps was the most “cut” of
the two, chaunted the Marsellaise hymn of liberty with
as much freedom as though he were sitting in the saddle.
Thus they proceeded laughing and singing until the
Bury pay-gate arrested their progress, when it occurred
to the steersman to ask if they were going right. “Be
this the vay to Newmarket races?” inquired Jorrocks
of the pike-keeper. The man dived into the small pocket
of his white apron for a ticket and very coolly replied,
“Shell out, old ‘un.” “How much?” said Jorrocks.
“Tuppence,” which having got, he said, “Now, then,
you may turn, for the heath be over yonder,” pointing
back, “at least it was there this morning, I know.”
After a volley of abuse for his impudence, Mr. Jorrocks,
with some difficulty got the old mare pulled round, for
she had a deuced hard mouth of her own, and only a
plain snaffle in it; at last, however, with the aid of a
boy to beat her with a furze-bush, they got her set
a-going again, and, retracing their steps, they trotted
“down street,” rose the hill, and entered the spacious
wide-extending flat of Newmarket Heath. The races were
going forward on one of the distant courses, and a slight,
insignificant, black streak, swelling into a sort of oblong
(for all the world like an overgrown tadpole), was all
that denoted the spot, or interrupted the verdant aspect
of the quiet extensive plain. Jorrocks was horrified,
having through life pictured Epsom as a mere drop in
the ocean compared with the countless multitude of
Newmarket, while the Baron, who was wholly indifferent
to the matter, nearly had old Jorrocks pitched over the
mare’s head by applying the furze-bush (which he had
got from the boy) to her tail while Mr. Jorrocks was
sitting loosely, contemplating the barrenness of the
prospect. The sherry was still alive, and being all for
fun, he shuffled back into the saddle as soon as the old
mare gave over kicking; and giving a loud tally-ho,
with some minor “hunting noises,” which were responded
to by the Baron in notes not capable of being
set to music, and aided by an equally indescribable
accompaniment from the old mare at every application
of the bush, she went off at score over the springy turf,
and bore them triumphantly to the betting-post just
as the ring was in course of formation, a fact which she
announced by a loud neigh on viewing her companion
of the plough, as well as by unpsetting some half-dozen
black-legs as she rushed through the crowd to greet her.
Great was the hubbub, shouting, swearing, and laughing,—for
though the Newmarketites are familiar with
most conveyances, from a pair of horses down to a pair
of shoes, it had not then fallen to their lot to see two
men ride into the ring on the same horse,—certainly
not with such a hat between them as the Baron’s.

The gravest and weightiest matters will not long
distract the attention of a black-leg, and the laughter
having subsided without Jorrocks or the Baron being
in the slightest degree disconcerted, the ring was again
formed; horses’ heads again turn towards the post,
while carriages, gigs, and carts form an outer circle.
A solemn silence ensues. The legs are scanning the list.
At length one gives tongue. “What starts? Does Lord
Eldon start?” “No, he don’t,” replies the owner. “Does
Trick, by Catton?” “Yes, and Conolly rides—but mind,
three pounds over.” “Does John Bull?” “No John’s
struck out.” “Polly Hopkins does, so does Talleyrand,
also O, Fy! out of Penitence; Beagle and Paradox also—and
perhaps Pickpocket.”

Another pause, and the pencils are pulled from the
betting-books. The legs and lords look at each other,
but no one likes to lead off. At length a voice is heard
offering to take nine to one he names the winner. “It’s
short odds, doing it cautiously. I’ll take eight then,”
he adds—”sivin!” but no one bites. “What will anyone
lay about Trick, by Catton?” inquires Jem Bland.
“I’ll lay three to two again him. I’ll take two to one—two
ponies to one, and give you a suv. for laying it.”
“Carn’t” is the answer. “I’ll do it, Jem,” cries a voice.
“No, you won’t,” from Bland, not liking his customer.
Now they are all at it, and what a hubbub there is!
“I’ll back the field—I’ll lay—I’ll take—I’ll
bet—ponies—fifties—hundreds—five
hundred to two.” “What do
you want, my lord?” “Three to one against Trick,
by Catton.” “Carn’t afford it—the odds really arn’t
that in the ring.” “Take two—two hundred to one.”
“No.” “Crockford, you’ll do it for me?” “Yes, my
lord. Twice over if you like. Done, done.” “Do it
again?” “No, thank you.”

“Trick, by Catton, don’t start!” cries a voice. “Impossible!”
exclaim his backers. “Quite true, I’m just
from the weighing-house, and——told me so himself.”
“Shame! shame!” roar those who have backed him,
and “honour—rascals—rogues—thieves—robbery—swindle—turf-ruined”—fly
from tongue to tongue, but
they are all speakers with never a speaker to cry order.
Meanwhile the lads have galloped by on their hacks
with the horses’ cloths to the rubbing-house, and the
horses have actually started, and are now visible in
the distance sweeping over the open heath, apparently
without guide or beacon.

The majority of the ring rush to the white judge’s
box, and have just time to range themselves along
the rude stakes and ropes that guard the run in, and
the course-keeper in a shooting-jacket on a rough pony
to crack his whip, and cry to half a dozen stable-lads
to “clear the course,” before the horses come flying
towards home. Now all is tremor; hope and fear vacillating
in each breast. Silence stands breathless with
expectation—all eyes are riveted—the horses come
within descrying distance—”beautiful!” three close
together, two behind. “Clear the course! clear the
course! pray clear the course!” “Polly Hopkins! Polly
Hopkins!” roar a hundred voices as they near. “O,
Fy! O, Fy!” respond an equal number. “The horse!
the horse!” bellow a hundred more, as though their
yells would aid his speed, as Polly Hopkins, O, Fy!
and Talleyrand rush neck-and-neck along the cords
and pass the judge’s box. A cry of “dead heat!” is heard.
The bystanders see as suits their books, and immediately
rush to the judge’s box, betting, bellowing, roaring, and
yelling the whole way. “What’s won? what’s won?
what’s won?” is vociferated from a hundred voices.
“Polly Hopkins! Polly Hopkins! Polly Hopkins!” replies
Mr. Clark with judicial dignity. “By how much? by
how much?” “Half a head—half a head,” ¹⁸ replies the
same functionary. “What’s second?” “O, Fy!” and
so, amid the song of “Pretty, pretty Polly Hopkins,”
from the winners, and curses and execrations long,
loud, and deep, from the losers, the scene closes.

Footnote 18: (return) No judge ever gave a race as won by half a head; but we let
the whole passage stand as originally written.—EDITOR.

The admiring winners follow Polly to the rubbing-house,
while the losing horses are left in the care of their
trainers and stable-boys, who console themselves with
hopes of “better luck next time.”

After a storm comes a calm, and the next proceeding
is the wheeling of the judge’s box, and removal of the
old stakes and ropes to another course on a different
part of the heath, which is accomplished by a few ragged
rascals, as rude and uncouth as the furniture they bear.
In less than half an hour the same group of anxious
careworn countenances are again turned upon each
other at the betting-post, as though they had never
separated. But see! the noble owner of Trick, by Catton,
is in the crowd, and Jem Bland eyeing him like a hawk.
“I say, Waggey,” cries he (singling out a friend stationed
by his lordship), “had you ought on Trick, by Catton?”
“No, Jem,” roars Wagstaff, shaking his head, “I knew
my man too well.” “Why now, Waggey, do you know
I wouldn’t have done such a thing for the world! no,
not even to have been made a Markiss!” a horse-laugh
follows this denunciation, at which the newly created
marquis bites his livid lips.

The Baron, who appears to have no taste for walking,
still sticks to the punch mare, which Mr. Jorrocks
steers to the newly formed ring aided by the Baron
and the furze-bush. Here they come upon Sam Spring,
whose boy has just brought his spring-cart to bear upon
the ring formed by the horsemen, and thinking it a pity
a nobleman of any county should be reduced to the
necessity of riding double, very politely offers to take
one into his carriage. Jorrocks accepts the offer, and
forthwith proceeds to make himself quite at home in
it. The chorus again commences, and Jorrocks interrogates
Sam as to the names of the brawlers. “Who be
that?” said he, “offering to bet a thousand to a hundred.”
Spring, after eyeing him through his spectacles,
with a grin and a look of suspicion replies, “Come now—come—let’s
have no nonsense—you know as well as
I.” “Really,” replies Mr. Jorrocks most earnestly, “I
don’t.” “Why, where have you lived all your life?”
“First part of it with my grandmother at Lisson Grove,
afterwards at Camberwell, but now I resides in Great
Coram Street, Russell Square—a werry fashionable
neighbourhood.” “Oh, I see,” replies Sam, “you are
one of the reg’lar city coves, then—now, what brings
you here?” “Just to say that I have been at Newmarket,
for I’m blowed if ever you catch me here again.” “That’s
a pity,” replied Sam, “for you look like a promising
man—a handsome-bodied chap in the face—don’t you
sport any?” “O a vast!—’unt regularly—I’m a member
of the Surrey ‘unt—capital one it is too—best in England
by far.” “What do you hunt?” inquired Sam. “Foxes,
to be sure.” “And are they good eating?” “Come,”
replied Jorrocks, “you know, as well as I do, we don’t
eat ’em.” The dialogue was interrupted by someone
calling to Sam to know what he was backing.

“The Bedlamite colt, my lord,” with a forefinger to
his hat. “Who’s that?” inquired Jorrocks. “That’s my
Lord L——, a baron-lord—and a very nice one—best
baron-lord I know—always bets with me—that’s another
baron-lord next him, and the man next him is a baron-knight,
a stage below a baron-lord—something between
a nobleman and a gentleman.” “And who be that
stout, good-looking man in a blue coat and velvet collar
next him, just rubbing his chin with the race card—he’ll
be a lord too, I suppose?” “No,—that’s Mr. Gully,
as honest a man as ever came here,—that’s Crockford
before him. The man on the right is Mr. C——, who
they call the ‘cracksman,’ because formerly he was a
professional housebreaker, but he has given up that
trade, and turned gentleman, bets, and keeps a gaming-table.
This little ugly black-faced chap, that looks for
all the world like a bilious Scotch terrier, has lately come
among us. He was a tramping pedlar—sold worsted
stockings—attended country courses, and occasionally
bet a pair. Now he bets thousands of pounds, and keeps
racehorses. The chaps about him all covered with chains
and rings and brooches, were in the duffing line—sold
brimstoned sparrows for canary-birds, Norwich shawls
for real Cashmere, and dried cabbage-leaves for cigars.
Now each has a first-rate house, horses and carriages,
and a play-actress among them. Yon chap, with the
extravagantly big mouth, is a cabinet-maker at Cambridge.
He’ll bet you a thousand pounds as soon as
look at you.”

“The chap on the right of the post with the red tie,
is the son of an ostler. He commenced betting thousands
with a farthing capital. The man next him, all teeth
and hair, like a rat-catcher’s dog, is an Honourable by
birth, but not very honourable in his nature.” “But
see,” cried Mr. Jorrocks, “Lord—— is talking to the
Cracksman.” “To be sure,” replies Sam, “that’s the
beauty of the turf. The lord and the leg are reduced
to an equality. Take my word for it, if you have a turn
for good society, you should come upon the turf.—I
say, my Lord Duke!” with all five fingers up to his
hat, “I’ll lay you three to two on the Bedlamite colt.”
“Done, Mr. Spring,” replies his Grace, “three ponies
to two.” “There!” cried Mr. Spring, turning to Jorrocks,
“didn’t I tell you so?” The riot around the post increases.
It is near the moment of starting, and the legs
again become clamorous for what they want. Their
vehemence increases. Each man is in extremis. “They
are off!” cries one. “No, they are not,” replies another.
“False start,” roars a third. “Now they come!” “No,
they don’t!” “Back again.” They are off at last, however,
and away they speed over the flat. The horses
come within descrying distance. It’s a beautiful race—run
at score the whole way, and only two tailed off
within the cords. Now they set to—whips and spurs
go, legs leap, lords shout, and amid the same scene
of confusion, betting, galloping, cursing, swearing, and
bellowing, the horses rush past the judge’s box.

But we have run our race, and will not fatigue our
readers with repetition. Let us, however, spend the
evening, and then the “Day at Newmarket” will be
done.

Mr. Spring, with his usual attention to strangers,
persuades Mr. Jorrocks to make one of a most agreeable
dinner-party at the “White Hart” on the assurance
of spending a delightful evening. Covers are laid for
sixteen in the front room downstairs, and about six
o’clock that number are ready to sit down. Mr. Badchild,
the accomplished keeper of an oyster-room and
minor hell in Pickering Place, is prevailed upon to take
the chair, supported on his right by Mr. Jorrocks, and
on his left by Mr. Tom Rhodes, of Thames Street, while
the stout, jolly, portly Jerry Hawthorn fills—in the
fullest sense of the word—the vice-chair. Just as the
waiters are removing the covers, in stalks the Baron,
in his conical hat, and reconnoitres the viands. Sam,
all politeness, invites him to join the party. “I tank
you,” replies the Baron, “but I have my wet in de
next room.” “But bring your wet with you,” rejoins
Sam, “we’ll all have our wet together after dinner,”
thinking the Baron meant his wine.

The usual inn grace—”For what we are going to
receive, the host expects to be paid”,—having been
said with great feeling and earnestness, they all set to
at the victuals, and little conversation passed until the
removal of the cloth, when Mr. Badchild, calling upon
his vice, observed that as in all probability there were
gentlemen of different political and other opinions present,
perhaps the best way would be to give a comprehensive
toast, and so get over any debatable ground,—he
therefore proposed to drink in a bumper “The king,
the queen, and all the royal family, the ministry, particularly
the Master of the Horse, the Army, the Navy,
the Church, the State, and after the excellent dinner
they had eaten, he would include the name of the landlord
of the White Hart” (great applause). Song from
Jerry Hawthorn—”The King of the Cannibal Islands”.—The
chairman then called upon the company to fill
their glasses to a toast upon which there could be no
difference of opinion. “It was a sport which they all
enjoyed, one that was delightful to the old and to the
young, to the peer and to the peasant, and open to all.
Whatever might be the merits of other amusements, he
had never yet met any man with the hardihood to deny
that racing was at once the noblest and the most legitimate”
(loud cheers, and thumps on the table, that set
all the glasses dancing), “not only was it the noblest
and most legitimate, but it was the most profitable;
and where was the man of high and honourable principle
who did not feel when breathing the pure atmosphere
of that Heath, a lofty self-satisfaction at the thought,
that though he might have left those who were near
and dear to him in a less genial atmosphere, still he was
not selfishly enjoying himself, without a thought for
their welfare; for racing, while it brought health and
vigour to the father, also brought what was dearer to
the mind of a parent—the means of promoting the
happiness and prosperity of his family—(immense
cheers). With these few observations he should simply
propose ‘The Turf,’ and may we long be above it”—(applause
and, on the motion of Mr. Spring, three cheers
for Mrs. Badchild and all the little Badchildren were
called for and given). When the noise had subsided.
Mr. Jorrocks very deliberately got up, amid whispers
and inquiries as to who he was. “Gentlemen,” said he,
with an indignant stare, and a thump on the table,
“Gentlemen, I say, in much of what has fallen from
our worthy chairman, I go-in-sides, save in what he
says about racing—I insists that ‘unting is the sport of
sports” (immense laughter, and cries of “wot an old
fool!”) “Gentlemen may laugh, but I say it’s a fact,
and though I doesn’t wish to create no displeasancy
whatsomever, yet I should despise myself most confoundedly—should
consider myself unworthy of the
great and distinguished ‘unt to which I have the honour
to belong, if I sat quietly down without sticking up for
the chase (laughter).—I say, it’s one of the balances of
the constitution (laughter).—I say, it’s the sport of
kings! the image of war without its guilt (hisses and
immense laughter). He would fearlessly propose a
bumper toast—he would give them ‘fox-hunting.'”
There was some demur about drinking it, but on the
interposition of Sam Spring, who assured the company
that Jorrocks was one of the right sort, and with an
addition proposed by Jerry Hawthorn, which made the
toast more comprehensible, they swallowed it, and the
chairman followed it up with “The Sod”,—which was
drunk with great applause. Mr. Cox of Blue Hammerton
returned thanks. “He considered cock-fighting the
finest of all fine amusements. Nothing could equal the
rush between two prime grey-hackles—that was his
colour. The chairman had said a vast for racing, and
to cut the matter short, he might observe that cock-fighting
combined all the advantages of making money,
with the additional benefit of not being interfered with
by the weather. He begged to return his best thanks
for himself and brother sods, and only regretted he had
not been taught speaking in his youth, or he would
certainly have convinced them all, that ‘cocking’ was
the sport.” “Coursing” was the next toast—for which
Arthur Pavis, the jockey, returned thanks. “He was
very fond of the ‘long dogs,’ and thought, after racing,
coursing was the true thing. He was no orator, and so
he drank off his wine to the health of the company.”
“Steeplechasing” followed, for which Mr. Coalman of
St. Albans returned thanks, assuring the company that
it answered his purpose remarkably well. Then the Vice
gave the “Chair,” and the Chair gave the “Vice”; and
by way of a finale, Mr. Badchild proposed the game of
“Chicken-hazard,” observing in a whisper to Mr. Jorrocks,
that perhaps he would like to subscribe to a joint-stock
purse for the purpose of going to hell. To which Mr.
Jorrocks, with great gravity, replied; “Sir, I’m d——d
if I do.”

VI. A WEEK AT CHELTENHAM:
THE CHELTENHAM DANDY

Mr. Jorrocks had been very poorly indeed of indigestion,
as he calls it, produced by tucking in too much
roast beef and plum pudding at Christmas, and prolonging
the period of his festivities a little beyond the
season allowed by Moore’s Almanack, and having in
vain applied the usual remedies prescribed on such
occasions, he at length consented to try the Cheltenham
waters, though altogether opposed to the element,
he not having “astonished his stomach,” as he says,
for the last fifteen years with a glass of water.

Having established himself and the Yorkshireman in
a small private lodging in High Street, consisting of
two bedrooms and a sitting-room, he commenced his
visits to the royal spa, and after a few good drenches,
picked up so rapidly, that to whatever inn they went
to dine, the landlords and waiters were astounded at
the consumption of prog, and in a very short time he
was known from the “Royal Hotel” down to Hurlston’s
Commercial Inn, as the great London Cormorant. At
first, however, he was extremely depressed in spirits,
and did nothing the whole day after his arrival, but
talk about the arrangement of his temporal affairs;
and the first symptom he gave of returning health was
one day at dinner at the “Plough,” by astonishing two
or three scarlet-coated swells, who as usual were disporting
themselves in the coffee-room, by bellowing to
the waiter for some Talli-ho “sarce” to his fish. Before
this he had never once spoken of his favourite diversion,
and the sportsmen cantered by the window to cover
in the morning, and back in the afternoon, without
eliciting a single observation from him. The morning
after this change for the better, he addressed his companion
at breakfast as follows: “Blow me tight, Mr.
York, if I arn’t regularly renowated. I’m as fresh as
an old hat after a shower of rain. I really thinks I shall
get over this terrible illness, for I dreamt of ‘unting
last night, and, if you’ve a mind, we’ll go and see my
Lord Segrave’s reynard dog, and then start from this
‘ere corrupt place, for, you see, it’s nothing but a town,
and what’s the use of sticking oneself in a little pokey
lodging like this ‘ere, where there really is not room to
swing a cat, and paying the deuce knows how much tin,
too, when one has a splendid house in Great Coram
Street going on all the time, with a rigler establishment
of servants and all that sort of thing. Now, you knows,
I doesn’t grudge a wisit to Margate, though that’s a
town too, but then, you see, one has the sea to look at,
whereas here, it’s nothing but a long street with shops,
not so good as those in Red Lion Street, with a few
small streets branching off from it, and as to the prommenard,
as they calls it, aside the spa, with its trees
and garden stuff, why, I’m sure, to my mind, the
Clarence Gardens up by the Regent’s Park, are quite
as fine. It’s true the doctor says I must remain another
fortnight to perfect the cure, but then them ‘ere M.D.’s,
or whatever you calls them, are such rum jockeys, and
I always thinks they say one word for the patient and
two for themselves. Now, my chap said, I must only
take half a bottle o’ black strap a day at the werry
most, whereas I have never had less than a whole one—his
half first, as I say, and my own after—and because
I tells him I take a pint, he flatters himself his
treatment is capital, and that he is a wonderful M.D.;
but as a man can’t be better than well, I think we’ll
just see what there’s to be seen in the neighbourhood,
and then cut our sticks, and, as I said before, I should
like werry much to see my Lord Segrave’s hounds, in
order that I may judge whether there is anything in
the wide world to be compared to the Surrey, for if I
remember right, Mr. Nimrod described them as werry,
werry fine, indeed.”

Having formed this resolution, Jorrocks stamped on
the floor (for the bell was broken) for the little boy who
did the odd jobs of the house, to bring up his Hessian
boots, into which having thrust his great calves, and
replaced the old brown great-coat which he uses for a
dressing-gown by a superfine Saxony blue, with metal
buttons and pockets outside, he pulled his wig straight,
stuck his white hat with the green flaps knowingly on
his head, and sallied forth for execution as stout a man
as ever. Knowing that the kennel is near the Winchcourt
road, they proceeded in that direction, but after
walking about a mile, came upon a groom on a chestnut
horse, who, returning from the chase, was wetting his
whistle at the appropriate sign of the “Fox and Hounds,”
and who informed them that they had passed the turning
for the kennel, but that the hounds were out, and
then in a wood which he pointed out on the hillside
about two miles off, into which they had just brought
their fox. Looking in that direction, they presently
saw the summit of one of the highest of the range of
hills that encircle the town of Cheltenham, covered with
horsemen and pedestrians, who kept moving backwards
and forwards on the “mountain’s brow,” looking in the
distance more like a flock of sheep than anything else.
Jorrocks, being all right again and up to anything, proposed
a start to the wood, and though he thought they
should hardly reach it before the hounds either killed
their fox or he broke away again, they agreed to take
the chance, and away they went, “best leg first” as the
saying is. The cover (Queen Wood by name, and, as
Jorrocks found out from somebody, the property of
Lord Ellenborough) being much larger than it at first
appeared and the fox but a bad one, they were in lots
of time, and having toiled to the top of the wood,
Jorrocks swaggered in among the horsemen with all
the importance of an alderman. For full an hour after
they got there the hounds kept running in cover, the
fox being repeatedly viewed and the pack continually
pressing him. Once or twice he came out, but after
skirting the cover’s edge a few yards turned in again.
Indeed, there were two foxes on foot, one being a three-legged
one, and it was extraordinary how he went and
stood before hounds, going apparently very cautiously
and stopping every now and then to listen. At last a
thundering old grey-backed fellow went away before
the whole field, making for the steep declivities that
lead into the downs, and though the brow of the hill
was covered with foot-people who holloa’d and shouted
enough to turn a lion, he would make his point, and only
altering his course so as to avoid running right among
the mob, he gained the summit of the hill and disappeared.
This hill, being uncommonly steep, was a
breather for hounds that had been running so long as
they had, in a thick cover too, and neither they nor
the horses went at it with any great dash. The fox was
not a fellow to be caught very easily, and nothing but
a good start could have given them any chance, but
the hounds never got well settled to the scent, and
after a fruitless cast his lordship gave it up, and Jorrocks
and Co. trudged back to Cheltenham, J—— highly delighted
at so favourable an opportunity of seeing the
hounds. Indeed, so pleased was he with the turn-out
and the whole thing, that finding from Skinner, one of
the whippers-in, that they met on the following morning
at Purge Down-turnpike, in their best country,
forgetting all about his indigestion and the royal spa,
he went to Newman and Longridge, the horse dealers
and livery stable keepers and engaged a couple of nags
“to look at the hounds upon,” as he impressed upon
their minds, which he ordered to be ready at nine o’clock.

This day he proposed to give the landlord of the
“George Inn,” in the High Street, the benefit of his
rapacious appetite, and about five o’clock (his latest
London hour) they sat down to dinner. The “George”
is neither exactly a swell house like the “Royal Hotel”
or the “Plough,” nor yet a commercial one, but something
betwixt and between. The coffee-room is very
small, consequently all the frequenters are drawn together,
and if a conversation is started a man must be
deuced unsociable that does not join in the cry.

As three or four were sitting round the fire chatting
over their tipple, and Jorrocks was telling some of his
best bouncers, the door opened and a waiter bowed a
fresh animal into the cage, who, after eyeing the party,
took off his hat and forthwith proceeded to pull off
divers neckcloths, cloaks, great-coats, muffitees, until
he reduced himself to about half the size he was on
entering. He was a little square-built old man, with
white hair and plenty of it, a long stupid red face with
little pig eyes, a very long awkward body, and very
short legs. He was dressed in a blue coat, buff waistcoat,
a sort of baggy grey or thunder-and-lightning
trousers, over which he had buttoned a pair of long
black gaiters. Having “peeled,” he rubbed his hands
and blew upon them, as much as to say, “Now, gentlemen,
won’t you let me have a smell of the fire?” and,
accordingly, by a sort of military revolution, they
made a place for him right in the centre.

“Coldish night I reckon, sir,” said Jorrocks, looking
him over.

“Very cold indeed, very cold indeed,” answered he,
rubbing his elbows against his ribs, and stamping with
his feet. “I’ve just got off the top of the Liverpool
coach, and, I can assure you, it’s very cold riding outside
a coach all day long—however, I always say that
it’s better than being inside, though, indeed, it’s very
little that I trouble coaches at all in the course of the
year—generally travel in my own carriage, only my
family have it with them in Bristol now, where I’m
going to join them; but I’m well used to the elements,
hunting, shooting, and fishing, as I do constantly.”

This later announcement made Jorrocks rouse up,
and finding himself in the company of a sportsman and
one, too, who travelled in his own carriage, he assumed
a different tone and commenced on a fresh tack—”and
pray, may I make bold to inquire what country you
hunts in, sir?” said he.

“Oh! I live in Cheshire—Mainwaring’s country, but
Melton’s the place I chiefly hunt at,—know all the
fellows there; rare set of dogs, to be sure,—only country
worth hunting in, to my mind.”

Jorrocks. Rigler swells, though, the chaps, arn’t they?
Recollect one swell of a fellow coming with his upper
lip all over fur into our country, thinking to astonish
our weak minds, but I reckon we told him out.

Stranger. What! you hunt, do you?

Jorrocks. A few—you’ve perhaps heard tell of the
Surrey ‘unt?

Stranger. Cocktail affair, isn’t it?

Jorrocks. No such thing, I assure you. Cocktail indeed!
I likes that.

Stranger. Well, but it’s not what we calls a fast-coach.

Jorrocks. I doesn’t know wot you calls a fast-coach,
but if you’ve a mind to make a match, I’ll bet you a
hat, ay, or half a dozen hats, that I’ll find a fellow to
take the conceit out o’ any your Meltonians.

Stranger. Oh! I don’t doubt but you have some good
men among you; I’m sure I didn’t mean anything
offensive, by asking if it was a cocktail affair, but we
Meltonians certainly have a trick, I must confess, of
running every other country down; come, sir, I’ll drink
the Surrey hunt with all my heart, said he, swigging
off the remains of a glass of brandy-and-water which
the waiter had brought him shortly after entering.

Jorrocks. Thank you, sir, kindly. Waiter, bring me
a bottom o’ brandy, cold, without—and don’t stint for
quantity, if you please. Doesn’t you think these inns
werry expensive places, sir? I doesn’t mean this in
particular, but inns in general.

Stranger. Oh! I don’t know, sir. We must expect to
pay. “Live and let live,” is my motto. I always pay
my inn bills without looking them over. Just cast my
eyes at the bottom to see the amount, then call for pen
and ink, add so much for waiter, so much for chambermaid,
so much for boots, and if I’m travelling in my
own carriage so much for the ostler for greasing. That’s
the way I do business, sir.

Jorrocks. Well, sir, a werry pleasant plan too,
especially for the innkeeper—and all werry right for
a gentleman of fortune like you. My motto, however,
is “Waste not, want not,” and my wife’s father’s motto
was “Wilful waste brings woeful want,” and I likes to
have my money’s worth.—Now, said he, pulling out a
handful of bills, at some places that I go to they charges
me six shillings a day for my dinner, and when I was
ill and couldn’t digest nothing but the lightest and
plainest of breakfasts, when a fork breakfast in fact
would have made a stiff ‘un of me, and my muffin mill
was almost stopped, they charged me two shillings for
one cake, and sixpence for two eggs.—Now I’m in the
tea trade myself, you must know, and I contend that
as things go, or at least as things went before the Barbarian
eye, as they call Napier, kicked up a row with
the Hong merchants, it’s altogether a shameful imposition,
and I wonder people put up with it.

Stranger. Oh, sir, I don’t know. I think that it is
the charge all over the country. Besides, it doesn’t do
to look too closely at these things, and you must allow
something for keeping up the coffee-room, you know—fire,
candles, and so on.

Jorrocks. But blow me tight, you surely don’t want
a candle to breakfast by? However, I contends that
innkeepers are great fools for making these sort of
charges, for it makes people get out of their houses as
quick as ever they can, whereas they might be inclined
to stay if they could get things moderate.—For my
part I likes a coffee-room, but having been used to
commercial houses when I travelled, I knows what the
charges ought to be. Now, this room is snug enough
though small, and won’t require no great keeping up.

Stranger. No—but this room is smaller than the
generality of them, you know. They frequently have
two fires in them, besides no end of oil burning.—I
know the expense of these things, for I have a very
large house in the country, and rely upon it, innkeepers
have not such immense profits as many people imagines—but,
as I said before, “live and let live.”

Jorrocks. So says I, “live and let live”—but wot I
complains of is, that some innkeepers charge so much
that they won’t let people live. No man is fonder of
eating than myself, but I don’t like to pay by the
mouthful, or yet to drink tea at so much a thimbleful. By
the way, Sar, if you are not previously engaged, I should
be werry happy to supply you with red Mocho or best
Twankay at a very reasonable figure indeed for cash?

Stranger. Thank you, sir, thank you. Those are things
I never interfere with—leave all these things to my
people. My housekeeper sends me in her book every
quarter day, with an account of what she pays. I just
look at the amount—add so much for wages, and write
a cheque—”live and let live!” say I. However, added
he, pulling out his watch, and ringing the bell for the
chambermaid, “I hate to get up very early, so I think
it is time to go to bed, and I wish you a very good night,
gentlemen all.”

Jorrocks gets up, advances half-way to the door,
makes him one of his most obsequious bows, and
wishes him a werry good night. Having heard him tramp
upstairs and safely deposited in his bedroom, they
pulled their chairs together again, and making a smaller
circle round the fire, proceeded to canvass their departed
friend. Jorrocks began—”I say, wot a regular
swell the chap is—a Meltonian, too.—I wonders who
the deuce he is. Wish Mr. Nimrod was among us, he
could tell us all about him, I dare say. I’m blowed if
I didn’t take him for a commercial gentleman at first,
until he spoke about his carriages. I likes to see gentlemen
of fortune making themselves sociable by coming
into the coffee-room, instead of sticking themselves up
in private sitting-rooms, as if nobody was good enough
for them. You know Melton, Mr. York; did you ever
see the gentleman out?”

“I can’t say that I ever did,” said his friend, “but
people look so different in their red coats to what they
do in mufti, that there’s no such thing as recognising
them unless you had a previous acquaintance with them.
The fields in Leicestershire are sometimes so large that
it requires a residence to get anything like a general
knowledge of the hunt, and, you know, Northamptonshire’s
the country for my money, after Surrey, of
course.”

“I don’t think he is a gentleman,” observed a thin
sallow-complexioned young man, who, sitting on one
side of the fire, had watched the stranger very narrowly
without joining in the conversation. “He gives me more
the idea of a gentleman’s servant, acting the part of
master, than anything else.”

Jorrocks. Oh! he is a gentleman, I’m sure—besides,
a servant wouldn’t travel in a carriage you know, and
he talked about greasing the wheels and all that sort
of thing, which showed he was familiar with the thing.

“That’s very true,” replied the youth—”but a servant
may travel in the rumble and pay for greasing
the wheels all the same, or perhaps have to grease them
himself.”

“Well, I should say he’s a foolish purse-proud sort
of fellow,” observed another, “who has come into money
unexpectedly, and who likes to be the cock of his party,
and show off a little.”

Jorrocks. I’ll be bound to say you’re all wrong—you
are not fox-hunters, you see, or you would know that
that is a way the sportsmen have—we always make
ourselves at home and agreeable—have a word for
everybody in fact, and no reserve; besides, you see,
there was nothing gammonacious, as I calls it, about
his toggery, no round-cut coats with sporting buttons,
or coaches and four, or foxes for pins in his shirt.

“I don’t care for that,” replied the sallow youth,
“dress him as you will, court suit, bag wig, and sword,
you’ll make nothing better of him—he’s a SNOB.”

Jorrocks, getting up, runs to the table on which the
hats were standing, saying, “I wonder if he’s left his
castor behind him? I’ve always found a man’s hat will
tell a good deal. This is yours, Mr. York, with the loop
to it, and here’s mine—I always writes Golgotha in
mine, which being interpreted, you know, means the
place of a skull. These are yours, I presume, gentlemen?”
said he, taking up two others. “Confound him,
he’s taken his tile with him—however, I’m quite positive
he’s a gentleman—lay you a hat apiece all round he is,
if you like!”

“But how are we to prove it?” inquired the youth.

Jorrocks. Call in the waiter.

Youth. He may know nothing about him, and a
waiter’s gentleman is always the man who pays him
most.

Jorrocks. Trust the waiter for knowing something
about him, and if he doesn’t, why, it’s only to send a
purlite message upstairs, saying that two gentlemen in
the coffee-room have bet a trifle that he is some nobleman—Lord
Maryborough, for instance,—he’s a little
chap—but we must make haste, or the gentleman will
be asleep.

“Well, then, I’ll take your bet of a hat,” replied the
youth, “that he is not what I call a gentleman.”

Jorrocks. I don’t know what you calls a gentleman.
I’ll lay you a hat, a guinea one, either white or black,
whichever you like, but none o’ your dog hairs or
gossamers, mind—that he’s a man of dibs, and doesn’t
follow no trade or calling, and if that isn’t a gentleman,
I don’t know wot is. What say you, Mr. York?

“Suppose we put it thus—You bet this gentleman a
hat that he’s a Meltonian, which will comprise all the
rest.”

Jorrocks. Werry well put. Do you take me, sir? A
guinea hat against a guinea hat.

“I do,” said the youth.

Jorrocks. Then DONE—now ring the bell for the
waiter—I’ll pump him.

Enter waiter.

Jorrocks. Snuff them candles, if you please, and bring
me another bottom o’ brandy-cold, without—and,
waiter! here, pray who is that gentleman that came in
by the Liverpool coach to-night? The little gentleman
in long black gaiters who sat in this chair, you know,
and had some brandy-and-water.

Waiter. I know who you mean, sir, quite well, the
gentleman who’s gone to bed. Let me see, what’s his
name? He keeps that large Hotel in—— Street,
Liverpool—what’s the—Here an immense burst
of laughter drowned the remainder of the sentence.

Jorrocks rose in a rage. “No! you double-distilled
blockhead,” said he, “no such thing—you’re thinking
of someone else. The gentleman hunts at Melton Mowbray,
and travels in his own carriage.”

Waiter. I don’t know nothing about Melton Mowbray,
sir, but the last time he came through here on his road
to Bristol, he was in one of his own rattle-trap yellows,
and had such a load—his wife, a nurse, and eight children
inside; himself, his son, and an apple-tree on the dickey—that
the horses knocked up half-way and…

Jorrocks. Say no more—say no more—d——n his teeth
and toe-nails—and that’s swearing—a thing I never do
but on the most outrageous occasions. Confounded
humbug, I’ll be upsides with him, however. Waiter,
bring the bill and no more brandy. Never was so done
in all my life—a gammonacious fellow! “There, sir,
there’s your one pound one,” said he, handing a sovereign
and a shilling to the winner of the hat. “Give me my
tile, and let’s mizzle.—Waiter, I can’t wait; must bring
the bill up to my lodgings in the morning if it isn’t ready.—Come
away, come away—I shall never get over this
as long as ever I live. ‘Live and let live,’ indeed! no
wonder he stuck up for the innkeepers—a publican and
a sinner as he is. Good night, gentlemen, good night.”

Exit Jorrocks.

VII. AQUATICS: MR. JORROCKS AT
MARGATE

The shady side of Cheapside had become a luxury,
and footmen in red plush breeches objects of real commiseration,
when Mr. Jorrocks, tired of the heat and
“ungrateful hurry of the town,” resolved upon undertaking
an aquatic excursion. He was sitting, as is “his
custom always in the afternoon,” in the arbour at the
farther end of his gravel walk, which he dignifies by
the name of “garden,” and had just finished a rough
mental calculation, as to whether he could eat more
bread spread with jam or honey, when the idea of the
jaunt entered his imagination. Being a man of great
decision, he speedily winnowed the project over in his
mind, and producing a five-pound note from the fob
of his small clothes, passed it in review between his
fingers, rubbed out the creases, held it up to the light,
refolded and restored it to his fob. “Batsay,” cried he,
“bring my castor—the white one as hangs next the
blue cloak;” and forthwith a rough-napped, unshorn-looking,
white hat was transferred from the peg to
Mr. Jorrocks’s head. This done, he proceeded to the
“Piazza,” where he found the Yorkshireman exercising
himself up and down the spacious coffee-room, and,
grasping his hand with the firmness of a vice, he forthwith
began unburthening himself of the object of his
mission. “‘Ow are you?” said he, shaking his arm like
the handle of a pump. “‘Ow are you, I say?—I’m so
delighted to see you, ye carn’t think—isn’t this charming
weather! It makes me feel like a butterfly—really
think the ‘air is sprouting under my vig.” Here he took
off his wig and rubbed his hand over his bald head, as
though he were feeling for the shoots.

“Now to business—Mrs. J—— is away at Tooting,
as you perhaps knows, and I’m all alone in Great Coram
Street, with the key of the cellar, larder, and all that
sort of thing, and I’ve a werry great mind to be off on
a jaunt—what say you?” “Not the slightest objection,”
replied the Yorkshireman, “on the old principle of you
finding cash, and me finding company.” “Why, now
I’ll tell you, werry honestly, that I should greatly prefer
your paying your own shot; but, however, if you’ve a
mind to do as I do, I’ll let you stand in the half of a
five-pound note and whatever silver I have in my
pocket,” pulling out a great handful as he spoke, and
counting up thirty-two and sixpence. “Very good,”
replied the Yorkshireman when he had finished, “I’m
your man;—and not to be behindhand in point of
liberality, I’ve got threepence that I received in change
at the cigar divan just now, which I will add to the
common stock, so that we shall have six pounds twelve
and ninepence between us.” “Between us!” exclaimed
Mr. Jorrocks, “now that’s so like a Yorkshireman. I
declare you Northerns seem to think all the world are
asleep except yourselves;—howsomever, I von’t quarrel
with you—you’re a goodish sort of chap in your way,
and so long as I keep the swag, we carn’t get far
wrong. Well, then, to-morrow at two we’ll start for
Margate—the most delightful place in all the world,
where we will have a rare jollification, and can stay just
as long as the money holds out. So now good-bye—I’m
off home again to see about wittles for the woyage.”

It were almost superfluous to mention that the following
day was a Saturday—for no discreet citizen would
think of leaving town on any other. It dawned with
uncommon splendour, and the cocks of Coram Street
and adjacent parts seemed to hail the morn with more
than their wonted energy. Never, save on a hunting
morning, did Mr. Jorrocks tumble about in bed with
such restless anxiety as cock after cock took up the
crow in every gradation of noise from the shrill note
of the free street-scouring chanticleer before the door,
to the faint response of the cooped and prisoned victims
of the neighbouring poulterer’s, their efforts being aided
by the flutterings and impertinent chirruping of swarms
of town-bred sparrows.

At length the boy, Binjimin, tapped at his master’s
door, and, depositing his can of shaving-water on his
dressing-table, took away his coat and waistcoat, under
pretence of brushing them, but in reality to feel if he
had left any pence in the pockets. With pleasure Mr.
Jorrocks threw aside the bed-clothes, and bounded upon
the floor with a bump that shook his own and adjoining
houses. On this day a few extra minutes were devoted
to his toilet, one or two of which were expended
in adjusting a gold foxhead pin in a conspicuous part
of his white tie, and in drawing on a pair of new dark
blue stocking-net pantaloons, made so excessively tight,
that at starting, any of his Newmarket friends would
have laid three to two against his ever getting into
them at all. When on, however, they fully developed
the substantial proportions of his well-rounded limbs,
while his large tasselled Hessians showed that the bootmaker
had been instructed to make a pair for a “great
calf.” A blue coat, with metal buttons, ample laps, and
pockets outside, with a handsome buff kerseymere waistcoat,
formed his costume on this occasion. Breakfast
being over, he repaired to St. Botolph Lane, there to
see his letters and look after his commercial affairs; in
which the reader not being interested, we will allow
the Yorkshireman to figure a little.

About half-past one this enterprising young man
placed himself in Tommy Sly’s wherry at the foot of
the Savoy stairs, and not agreeing in opinion with
Mr. Jorrocks that it is of “no use keeping a dog and
barking oneself,” he took an oar and helped to row himself
down to London Bridge. At the wharf below the
bridge there lay a magnificent steamer, painted pea-green
and white, with flags flying from her masts, and
the deck swarming with smart bonnets and bodices. Her
name was the Royal Adelaide, from which the sagacious
reader will infer that this excursion was made during
the late reign. The Yorkshireman and Tommy Sly having
wormed their way among the boats, were at length
brought up within one of the vessels, and after lying
on their oars a few seconds, they were attracted by,
“Now, sir, are you going to sleep there?” addressed to
a rival nautical whose boat obstructed the way, and on
looking up on deck what a sight burst upon the Yorkshireman’s
astonished vision!—Mr. Jorrocks, with his
coat off, and a fine green velvet cap or turban, with a
broad gold band and tassel, on his head, hoisting a great
hamper out of the wherry, rejecting all offers of assistance,
and treating the laughter and jeers of the porters and
bystanders with ineffable contempt. At length he placed
the load to his liking, and putting on his coat, adjusted
his hunting telescope, and advanced to the side, as the
Yorkshireman mounted the step-ladder and came upon
deck. “Werry near being over late,” said he, pulling
out his watch, just at which moment the last bell rang,
and a few strokes of the paddles sent the vessel away
from the quay. “A miss is as good as a mile,” replied
the Yorkshireman; “but pray what have you got in
the hamper?”

“In the ‘amper! Why, wittles to be sure. You seem
to forget we are going a woyage, and ‘ow keen the sea
hair is. I’ve brought a knuckle of weal, half a ham, beef,
sarsingers, chickens, sherry white, and all that sort of
thing, and werry acceptable they’ll be by the time we
get to the Nore, or may be before.”

“Ease her! Stop her!” cried the captain through his
trumpet, just as the vessel was getting into her stride
in mid-stream, and, with true curiosity, the passengers
flocked to the side, to see who was coming, though
they could not possibly have examined half they had
on board. Mr. Jorrocks, of course, was not behindhand
in inquisitiveness, and proceeded to adjust his telescope.
A wherry was seen rowing among the craft, containing
the boatman, and a gentleman in a woolly white hat,
with a bright pea-green coat, and a basket on his knee.
“By jingo, here’s Jemmy Green!” exclaimed Mr.
Jorrocks, taking his telescope from his eye, and giving
his thigh a hearty slap. “How unkimmon lucky! The
werry man of all others I should most like to see. You
know James Green, don’t you?” addressing the Yorkshireman—”young
James Green, junior, of Tooley
Street—everybody knows him—most agreeable young
man in Christendom—fine warbler—beautiful dancer—everything
that a young man should be.”

“How are you James?” cried Jorrocks, seizing him
by the hand as his friend stepped upon deck; but
whether it was the nervousness occasioned by the rocking
of the wherry, or the shaking of the step-ladder
up the side of the steamer, or Mr. Jorrocks’s new turban
cap, but Mr. Green, with an old-maidish reserve, drew
back from the proffered embrace of his friend. “You
have the adwantage of me, sir,” said he, fidgeting back
as he spoke, and eyeing Mr. Jorrocks with unmeasured
surprise—”Yet stay—if I’m not deceived it’s Mr.
Jorrocks—so it is!” and thereupon they joined hands
most cordially, amid exclamations of, “‘Ow are you,
J——?” ‘”Ow are you, G——?” “‘Ow are you, J——?”
“So glad to see you, J——” “So glad to see you, G——”
“So glad to see you, J——” “And pray what may you
have in your basket?” inquired Mr. Jorrocks, putting
his hand to the bottom of a neat little green-and-white
willow woman’s basket, apparently for the purpose of
ascertaining its weight. “Only my clothes, and a little
prowision for the woyage. A baked pigeon, some cold
maccaroni, and a few pectoral lozenges. At the bottom
are my Margate shoes, with a comb in one, and a razor
in t’other; then comes the prog, and at the top, I’ve
a dickey and a clean front for to-morrow. I abominates
travelling with much luggage. Where, I ax, is the use
of carrying nightcaps, when the innkeepers always prowide
them, without extra charge? The same with regard
to soap. Shave, I say, with what you find in your tray.
A wet towel makes an excellent tooth-brush, and a pen-knife
both cuts and cleans your nails. Perhaps you’ll
present your friend to me,” added he in the same breath,
with a glance at the Yorkshireman, upon whose arm
Mr. Jorrocks was resting his telescope hand. “Much
pleasure,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, with his usual urbanity.
“Allow me to introduce Mr. Stubbs, Mr. Green, Mr.
Green, Mr. Stubbs: now pray shake hands,” added he,
“for I’m sure you’ll be werry fond of each other”; and
thereupon Jemmy, in the most patronising manner,
extended his two forefingers to the Yorkshireman, who
presented him with one in return. For the information
of such of our readers as may never have seen Mr.
James Green, senior junior, either in Tooley Street,
Southwark, where the patronymic name abounds, or
at Messrs. Tattersall’s, where he generally exhibits on
a Monday afternoon, we may premise, that though a
little man in stature, he is a great man in mind and a
great swell in costume. On the present occasion, as
already stated, he had on a woolly white hat, his usual
pea-green coat, with a fine, false, four-frilled front to
his shirt, embroidered, plaited, and puckered, like a
lady’s habit-shirt. Down the front were three or four
different sorts of studs, and a butterfly brooch, made of
various coloured glasses, sat in the centre. His cravat
was of a yellow silk with a flowered border, confining
gills sharp and pointed that looked up his nostrils; his
double-breasted waistcoat was of red and yellow tartan
with blue glass post-boy buttons; and his trousers, which
were very wide and cut out over the foot of rusty-black
chamois-leather opera-boots, were of a broad blue stripe
upon a white ground. A curly, bushy, sandy-coloured
wig protruded from the sides of his woolly white hat,
and shaded a vacant countenance, which formed the
frontispiece of a great chuckle head. Sky-blue gloves and
a stout cane, with large tassels, completed the rigging
of this borough dandy. Altogether he was as fine as any
peacock, and as vain as the proudest.

“And ‘ow is Mrs. J——?” inquired Green with the
utmost affability—”I hopes she’s uncommon well—pray,
is she of your party?” looking round. “Why,
no,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, “she’s off at Tooting at her
mother’s, and I’m just away, on the sly, to stay a five-pound
at Margate this delightful weather. ‘Ow long do
you remain?” “Oh, only till Monday morning—I goes
every Saturday; in fact,” added he in an undertone,
“I’ve a season ticket, so I may just as well use it, as
stay poking in Tooley Street with the old folks, who
really are so uncommon glumpy, that it’s quite refreshing
to get away from them.”

“That’s a pity,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, with one of
his benevolent looks. “But ‘ow comes it, James, you
are not married? You are not a bouy now, and should
be looking out for a home of your own.” “True, my
dear J——, true,” replied Mr. Green; “and I’ll tell
you wot, our principal book-keeper and I have made
many calculations on the subject, and being a man of
literature like yourself, he gave it as his opinion the
last time we talked the matter over, that it would only
be avoiding Silly and running into Crab-beds; which I
presume means Quod or the Bench. Unless he can have
a wife ‘made to order,’ he says he’ll never wed. Besides,
the women are such a bothersome encroaching set. I
declare I’m so pestered with them that I don’t know
vich vay to turn. They are always tormenting of me.
Only last week one sent me a specification of what she’d
marry me for, and I declare her dress, alone, came to
more than I have to find myself in clothes, ball-and
concert-tickets, keep an ‘oss, go to theatres, buy lozenges,
letter-paper, and everything else with. There were bumbazeens,
and challies, and merinos, and crape, and
gauze, and dimity, and caps, bonnets, stockings, shoes,
boots, rigids, stays, ringlets; and, would you believe
it, she had the unspeakable audacity to include a bustle!
It was the most monstrous specification and proposal
I ever read, and I returned it by the twopenny post,
axing her if she hadn’t forgotten to include a set of
false teeth. Still, I confess, I’m tired of Tooley Street.
I feel that I have a soul above hemp, and was intended
for a brighter sphere; but vot can one do, cooped up
at home without men of henergy for companions? No
prospect of improvement either; for I left our old gentleman
alarmingly well just now, pulling about the flax
and tow, as though his dinner depended upon his exertions.
I think if the women would let me alone, I might
have some chance, but it worries a man of sensibility and
refinement to have them always tormenting of one.—I’ve
no objection to be led, but, dash my buttons, I
von’t be driven.” “Certainly not,” replied Mr. Jorrocks,
with great gravity, jingling the silver in his breeches-pocket.
“It’s an old saying, James, and times proves
it true, that you may take an ‘oss to the water but you
carn’t make him drink—and talking of ‘osses, pray,
how are you off in that line?” “Oh, werry well—uncommon,
I may say—a thoroughbred, bang tail down to
the hocks, by Phantom, out of Baron Munchausen’s dam—gave
a hatful of money for him at Tatts’.—five fives—a
deal of tin as times go. But he’s a perfect ‘oss, I
assure you—bright bay with four black legs, and never
a white hair upon him. He’s touched in the vind, but
that’s nothing—I’m not a fox-hunter, you know, Mr.
Jorrocks; besides, I find the music he makes werry
useful in the streets, as a warning to the old happle
women to get out of the way. Pray, sir,” turning to the
Yorkshireman with a jerk, “do you dance?”—as the
boat band, consisting of a harp, a flute, a lute, a long
horn, and a short horn, struck up a quadrille,—and,
without waiting for a reply, our hero sidled past, and
glided among the crowd that covered the deck.

“A fine young man, James,” observed Mr. Jorrocks,
eyeing Jemmy as he elbowed his way down the boat—”fine
young man—wants a little of his father’s
ballast, but there’s no putting old heads on young
shoulders. He’s a beautiful dancer,” added Mr. Jorrocks,
putting his arm through the Yorkshireman’s, “let’s go
and see him foot it.” Having worked their way down,
they at length got near the dancers, and mounting a
ballast box had a fine view of the quadrille. There were
eight or ten couple at work, and Jemmy had chosen a
fat, dumpy, red-faced girl, in a bright orange-coloured
muslin gown, with black velvet Vandyked flounces, and
green boots—a sort of walking sunflower, with whom
he was pointing his toe, kicking out behind, and pirouetting
with great energy and agility. His male vis-à-vis
was a waistcoatless young Daniel Lambert, in white
ducks, and a blue dress-coat, with a carnation in his
mouth, who with a damsel in ten colours, reel’d to and
fro in humble imitation. “Green for ever!” cried Mr.
Jorrocks, taking off his velvet cap and waving it encouragingly
over his head: “Green for ever! Go it Green!”
and, accordingly, Green went it with redoubled vigour.
“Wiggins for ever!” responded a female voice opposite,
“I say, Wiggins!” which was followed by a loud clapping
of hands, as the fat gentleman made an astonishing step.
Each had his admiring applauders, though Wiggins
“had the call” among the ladies—the opposition voice
that put him in nomination proceeding from the mother
of his partner, who, like her daughter, was a sort of
walking pattern book. The spirit of emulation lasted
throughout the quadrille, after which, sunflower in hand,
Green traversed the deck to receive the compliments
of the company.

“You must be ‘ungry,” observed Mr. Jorrocks, with
great politeness to the lady, “after all your exertions,”
as the latter stood mopping herself with a coarse linen
handkerchief—”pray, James, bring your partner to
our ‘amper, and let me offer her some refreshment,”
which was one word for the Sunflower and two for himself,
the sea breeze having made Mr. Jorrocks what he
called “unkimmon peckish.” The hamper was speedily
opened, the knuckle of veal, the half ham, the aitch
bone of beef, the Dorking sausages (made in Drury
Lane), the chickens, and some dozen or two of plovers’
eggs were exhibited, while Green, with disinterested
generosity, added his baked pigeon and cold maccaroni
to the common stock. A vigorous attack was speedily
commenced, and was kept up, with occasional interruptions
by Green running away to dance, until they hove
in sight of Herne Bay, which caused an interruption to
a very interesting lecture on wines, that Mr. Jorrocks
was in the act of delivering, which went to prove that
port and sherry were the parents of all wines, port the
father, and sherry the mother; and that Bluecellas,
hock, Burgundy, claret, Teneriffe, Madeira, were made
by the addition of water, vinegar, and a few chemical
ingredients, and that of all “humbugs,” pale sherry was
the greatest, being neither more nor less than brown
sherry watered. Mr. Jorrocks then set to work to pack
up the leavings in the hamper, observing as he proceeded,
that wilful waste brought woeful want, and that
“waste not, want not,” had ever been the motto of the
Jorrocks family.

It was nearly eight o’clock ere the Royal Adelaide
touched the point of the far-famed Margate Jetty, a
fact that was announced as well by the usual bump, and
scuttle to the side to get out first, as by the band striking
up God save the King, and the mate demanding the
tickets of the passengers. The sun had just dropped
beneath the horizon, and the gas-lights of the town
had been considerately lighted to show him to bed, for
the day was yet in the full vigour of life and light.

Two or three other cargoes of cockneys having
arrived before, the whole place was in commotion,
and the beach swarmed with spectators as anxious
to watch this last disembarkation as they had been
to see the first. By a salutary regulation of the sages
who watch over the interests of the town, “all manner
of persons,” are prohibited from walking upon the jetty
during this ceremony, but the platform of which it is
composed being very low, those who stand on the beach
outside the rails, are just about on a right level to shoot
their impudence cleverly into the ears of the new-comers
who are paraded along two lines of gaping, quizzing,
laughing, joking, jeering citizens, who fire volleys of
wit and satire upon them as they pass. “There’s leetle
Jemmy Green again!” exclaimed a nursery-maid with
two fat, ruddy children in her arms, “he’s a beauty
without paint!” “Hallo, Jorrocks, my hearty! lend us
your hand,” cried a brother member of the Surrey Hunt.
Then there was a pointing of fingers and cries of “That’s
Jorrocks! that’s Green!” “That’s Green! that’s Jorrocks!”
and a murmuring titter, and exclamations of
“There’s Simpkins! how pretty he is!” “But there’s
Wiggins, who’s much nicer.” “My eye, what a cauliflower
hat Mrs. Thompson’s got!” “What a buck young
Snooks is!” “What gummy legs that girl in green has!”
“Miss Trotter’s bustle’s on crooked!” from the young
ladies at Miss Trimmer’s seminary who were drawn up
to show the numerical strength of the academy, and
act the part of walking advertisements. These observations
were speedily drowned by the lusty lungs of a
flyman bellowing out, as Green passed, “Hallo! my
young brockley-sprout, are you here again?—now then
for the tizzy you owe me,—I have been waiting here
for it ever since last Monday morning.” This salute
produced an irate look and a shake of his cane from
Green, with a mutter of something about “imperance,”
and a wish that he had his big fighting foreman there
to thrash him. When they got to the gate at the end,
the tide of fashion became obstructed by the kissings
of husbands and wives, the greetings of fathers and
sons, the officiousness of porters, the cries of flymen, the
importunities of innkeepers, the cards of bathing-women,
the salutations of donkey drivers, the programmes
of librarians, and the rush and push of the
inquisitive; and the waters of “comers” and “stayers”
mingled in one common flood of indescribable confusion.

Mr. Jorrocks, who, hamper in hand, had elbowed his
way with persevering resignation, here found himself
so beset with friends all anxious to wring his digits, that,
fearful of losing either his bed or his friends, he besought
Green to step on to the “White Hart” and see about
accommodation. Accordingly Green ran his fingers
through the bushy sides of his yellow wig, jerked up
his gills, and with a négligé air strutted up to that inn,
which, as all frequenters of Margate know, stands near
the landing-place, and commands a fine view of the
harbour. Mr. Creed, the landlord, was airing himself
at the door, or, as Shakespeare has it, “taking his ease
at his inn,” and knowing Green of old to be a most unprofitable
customer, he did not trouble to move his
position farther than just to draw up one leg so as not
wholly to obstruct the passage, and looked at him as
much as to say “I prefer your room to your company.”
“Quite full here, sir,” said he, anticipating Green’s
question. “Full, indeed?” replied Jemmy, pulling up
his gills—”that’s werry awkward, Mr. Jorrocks has
come down with myself and a friend, and we want
accommodation.” “Mr. Jorrocks, indeed!” replied Mr.
Creed, altering his tone and manner; “I’m sure I shall
be delighted to receive Mr. Jorrocks—he’s one of the
oldest customers I have—and one of the best—none
of your ‘glass of water and toothpick’ gentleman—real
downright, black-strap man, likes it hot and strong
from the wood—always pays like a gentleman—never
fights about three-pences, like some people I know,”
looking at Jemmy. “Pray, what rooms may you require?”
“Vy, there’s myself, Mr. Jorrocks, and Mr.
Jorrocks’s other friend—three in all, and we shall want
three good, hairy bedrooms.” “Well, I don’t know,”
replied Mr. Creed, laughing, “about their hairiness, but
I can rub them with bear’s grease for you.” Jemmy
pulled up his gills and was about to reply, when Mr.
Jorrocks’s appearance interrupted the dialogue. Mr.
Creed advanced to receive him, blowing up his porters
for not having been down to carry up the hamper, which
he took himself and bore to the coffee-room, amid protestations
of his delight at seeing his worthy visitor.

Having talked over the changes of Margate, of those
that were there, those that were not, and those that
were coming, and adverted to the important topic of
supper, Mr. Jorrocks took out his yellow and white
spotted handkerchief and proceeded to flop his Hessian
boots, while Mr. Creed, with his own hands, rubbed
him over with a long billiard-table brush. Green, too,
put himself in form by the aid of the looking-glass,
and these preliminaries being adjusted, the trio sallied
forth arm-in-arm, Mr. Jorrocks occupying the centre.
It was a fine, balmy summer evening, the beetles and
moths still buzzed and flickered in the air, and the sea
rippled against the shingly shore, with a low indistinct
murmur that scarcely sounded among the busy hum of
men. The shades of night were drawing on—a slight
mist hung about the hills, and a silvery moon shed a
broad brilliant ray upon the quivering waters “of the
dark blue sea,” and an equal light over the wide expanse
of the troubled town. How strange that man should
leave the quiet scenes of nature, to mix in myriads of
those they profess to quit cities to avoid! One turn to
the shore, and the gas-lights of the town drew back
the party like moths to the streets, which were literally
swarming with the population. “Cheapside, at three
o’clock in the afternoon,” as Mr. Jorrocks observed,
was never fuller than Margate streets that evening. All
was lighted up—all brilliant and all gay—care seemed
banished from every countenance, and pretty faces
and smart gowns reigned in its stead. Mr. Jorrocks
met with friends and acquaintances at every turn, most
of whom asked “when he came?” and “when he was
going away?” Having perambulated the streets, the
sound of music attracted Jemmy Green’s attention, and
our party turned into a long, crowded and brilliantly
lighted bazaar, just as the last notes of a barrel-organ
at the far end faded away, and a young woman in a
hat and feathers, with a swan’s-down muff and tippet,
was handed by a very smart young man in dirty white
Berlin gloves, and an equally soiled white waistcoat,
into a sort of orchestra above where, after the plaudits
of the company had subsided, she struck-up:

At the conclusion of the song, and before the company
had time to disperse, the same smart young
gentleman,—having rehanded the young lady from the
orchestra and pocketed his gloves,—ran his fingers
through his hair, and announced from that eminence,
that the spirited proprietors of the Bazaar were then
going to offer for public competition in the enterprising
shape of a raffle, in tickets, at one shilling each, a most
magnificently genteel, rosewood, general perfume box
fitted up with cedar and lined with red silk velvet,
adorned with cut-steel clasps at the sides, and a solid,
massive, silver name-plate at the top, with a best patent
Bramah lock and six chaste and beautifully rich cut-glass
bottles, and a plate-glass mirror at the top—a
box so splendidly perfect, so beautifully unique, as alike
to defy the powers of praise and the critiques of the
envious; and thereupon he produced a flashy sort of
thing that might be worth three and sixpence, for which
he modestly required ten subscribers, at a shilling each,
adding, “that even with that number the proprietors
would incur a werry heavy loss, for which nothing but
a boundless sense of gratitude for favours past could
possibly recompense them.” The youth’s eloquence and
the glitter of the box reflecting, as it did at every turn,
the gas-lights both in its steel and glass, had the desired
effect—shillings went down, and tickets went off rapidly,
until only three remained. “Four, five, and ten, are the
only numbers now remaining,” observed the youth, running
his eye up the list and wetting his pencil in his mouth.
“Four, five and ten! ten, four, five! five, four, ten! are
the only numbers now vacant for this werry genteel
and magnificent rosewood perfume-box, lined with red
velvet, cut-steel clasps, a silver plate for the name, best
patent Bramah lock, and six beautiful rich cut-glass
bottles, with a plate glass mirror in the lid—and only
four, five, and ten now vacant!” “I’ll take ten,” said
Green, laying down a shilling. “Thank you, sir—only
four and five now wanting, ladies and gentlemen—pray,
be in time—pray, be in time! This is without exception
the most brilliant prize ever offered for public competition.
There were only two of these werry elegant boxes
made,—the unfortunate mechanic who executed them
being carried off by that terrible malady, the cholera
morbus,—and the other is now in the possession of his
most Christian Majesty the King of the French. Only
four and five wanting to commence throwing for this
really perfect specimen of human ingenuity—only four
and five!” “I’ll take them,” cried Green, throwing down
two shillings more—and then the table was cleared—the
dice box produced, and the crowd drew round.
“Number one!—who holds number one?” inquired the
keeper, arranging the paper, and sucking the end of
his pencil. A young gentleman in a blue jacket and white
trousers owned the lot, and, accordingly, led off the
game. The lottery-keeper handed the box, and put in
the dice—rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, plop,
and lift up—”seven and four are eleven”—”now again,
if you please, sir,” putting the dice into the box—rattle,
rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, plop, and lift up—a
loud laugh—”one and two make three”—the youth
bit his lips;—rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle,
rattle, plop—a pause—and lift up—”threes!”—”six,
three, and eleven, are twenty.” “Now who holds
number two?—what lady or gentleman holds number
two? Pray, step forward!” The Sunflower drew near—Green
looked confused—she fixed her eye upon him,
half in fear, half in entreaty—would he offer to throw
for her? No, by Jove, Green was not so green as all
that came to, and he let her shake herself. She threw
twenty-two, thereby putting an extinguisher on the boy,
and raising Jemmy’s chance considerably. “Three” was
held by a youngster in nankeen petticoats, who would
throw for himself, and shook the box violently enough
to be heard at Broadstairs. He scored nineteen, and,
beginning to cry immediately, was taken home. Green
was next, and all eyes turned upon him, for he was a
noted hand. He advanced to the table with great sangfroid,
and, turning back the wrists of his coat, exhibited
his beautiful sparkling paste shirt buttons, and the
elegant turn of his taper hand, the middle finger of
which was covered with massive rings. He took the
box in a négligé manner, and without condescending
to shake it, slid the dice out upon the table by a gentle
sideway motion—”sixes!” cried all, and down the
marker put twelve. At the second throw, he adopted
another mode. As soon as the dice were in, he just
chucked them up in the air like as many halfpence,
and down they came five and six—”eleven,” said the
marker. With a look of triumph Green held the box
for the third time, which he just turned upside down,
and lo, on uncovering, there stood two—”ones!” A
loud laugh burst forth, and Green looked confused. “I’m
so glad!” whispered a young lady, who had made an
unsuccessful “set” at Jemmy the previous season, in
a tone loud enough for him to hear. “I hope he’ll lose,”
rejoined a female friend, rather louder. “That Jemmy
Green is my absolute abhorrence,” observed a third.
“‘Orrible man, with his nasty vig,” observed the mamma
of the first speaker—”shouldn’t have my darter not at
no price.” Green, however, headed the poll, having beat
the Sunflower, and had still two lots in reserve. For
number five, he threw twenty-five, and was immediately
outstripped, amid much laughter and clapping of hands
from the ladies, by number six, who in his turn fell a
prey to number seven. Between eight and nine there
was a very interesting contest who should be lowest,
and hopes and fears were at their altitude, when Jemmy
Green again turned back his coat-wrist to throw for
number ten. His confidence had forsaken him a little,
as indicated by a slight quivering of the under-lip, but
he managed to conceal it from all except the ladies, who
kept too scrutinising an eye upon him. His first throw
brought sixes, which raised his spirits amazingly; but
on their appearance a second time, he could scarcely
contain himself, backed as he was by the plaudits of
his friend Mr. Jorrocks. Then came the deciding throw—every
eye was fixed on Jemmy, he shook the box,
turned it down, and lo! there came seven.

“Mr. James Green is the fortunate winner of this
magnificent prize!” exclaimed the youth, holding up
the box in mid-air, and thereupon all the ladies crowded
round Green, some to congratulate him, others to compliment
him on his looks, while one or two of the least
knowing tried to coax him out of his box. Jemmy, however,
was too old a stager, and pocketed the box and
other compliments at the same time.

Another grind of the organ, and another song followed
from the same young lady, during which operation
Green sent for the manager, and, after a little beating
about the bush, proposed singing a song or two, if he
would give him lottery-tickets gratis. He asked three
shilling-tickets for each song, and finally closed for five
tickets for two songs, on the understanding that he was
to be announced as a distinguished amateur, who had
come forward by most particular desire.

Accordingly the manager—a roundabout, red-faced,
consequential little cockney—mounted the rostrum, and
begged to announce to the company that that “celebrated
wocalist, Mr. James Green, so well known as a
distinguished amateur and conwivialist, both at Bagnigge
Wells, and Vite Conduit House, LONDON, had
werry kindly consented, in order to promote the hilarity
of the evening, to favour the company with a song
immediately after the drawing of the next lottery,”
and after a few high-flown compliments, which elicited
a laugh from those who were up to Jemmy’s mode of
doing business, he concluded by offering a papier-maché
tea-caddy for public competition, in shilling
lots as before.

As soon as the drawing was over, they gave the organ
a grind, and Jemmy popped up with a hop, step, and
a jump, with his woolly white hat under his arm, and
presented himself with a scrape and a bow to the company.
After a few preparatory “hems and haws,” he
pulled up his gills and spoke as follows: “Ladies and
gentlemen! hem”—another pull at his gills—”ladies and
gentlemen—my walued friend, Mr. Kitey Graves, has
announced that I will entertain the company with a
song; though nothing, I assure you—hem—could be
farther from my idea—hem—when my excellent friend
asked me,”—”Hookey Walker!” exclaimed someone
who had heard Jemmy declare the same thing half a
dozen times—”and, indeed, ladies and gentlemen—hem—nothing
but the werry great regard I have for Mr.
Kitey Graves, who I have known and loved ever since
he was the height of sixpennorth of coppers” a loud
laugh followed this allusion, seeing that eighteenpenny-worth
would almost measure out the speaker. On giving
another “hem,” and again pulling up his gills, an old
Kentish farmer, in a brown coat and mahogany-coloured
tops, holloaed out, “I say, sir! I’m afear’d you’ll be
catching cold!” “I ‘opes not,” replied Jemmy in a
fluster, “is it raining? I’ve no umbrella, and my werry
best coat on!” “No! raining, no!” replied the farmer,
“only you’ve pulled at your shirt so long that I think
you must be bare behind! Haw! haw! haw!” at which
all the males roared with laughter, and the females hid
their faces in their handkerchiefs, and tittered and
giggled, and tried to be shocked. “ORDER! ORDER!”
cried Mr. Jorrocks, in a loud and sonorous voice, which
had the effect of quelling the riot and drawing all eyes
upon himself. “Ladies and gentlemen,” said he, taking
off his cap with great gravity, and extending his right
arm,

a couplet so apropos, and so well delivered, as to have
the immediate effect of restoring order and making the
farmer look foolish. Encouraged by the voice of his
great patron, Green once more essayed to finish his
speech, which he did by a fresh assurance of the surprise
by which he had been taken by the request of his friend,
Kitey Graves, and an exhortation for the company to
make allowance for any deficiency of “woice,” inasmuch
as how as labouring under “a wiolent ‘orseness,” for
which he had long been taking pectoral lozenges. He
then gave his gills another pull, felt if they were even,
and struck up:

in notes, compared to which the screaming of a peacock
would be perfect melody. Mr. Jorrocks having taken a
conspicuous position, applauded long, loudly, and
warmly, at every pause—approbation the more
deserved and disinterested, inasmuch as the worthy
gentleman suffers considerably from music, and only
knows two tunes, one of which, he says, “is God save
the King, and the other isn’t.”

Having seen his protégé fairly under way, Mr. Jorrocks
gave him a hint that he would return to the “White
Hart,” and have supper ready by the time he was done;
accordingly the Yorkshireman and he withdrew along
an avenue politely formed by the separation of the company,
who applauded as they passed.

An imperial quart and a half of Mr. Creed’s stoutest
draft port, with the orthodox proportion of lemon,
cloves, sugar, and cinnamon, had almost boiled itself
to perfection under the skilful superintendence of Mr.
Jorrocks, on the coffee-room fire, and a table had been
handsomely decorated with shrimps, lobsters, broiled
bones, fried ham, poached eggs, when just as the clock
had finished striking eleven, the coffee-room door opened
with a rush, and in tripped Jemmy Green with his hands
crammed full of packages, and his trousers’ pockets
sticking out like a Dutch burgomaster’s. “Vell, I’ve
done ’em brown to-night, I think,” said he, depositing
his hat and half a dozen packages on the sideboard, and
running his fingers through his curls to make them
stand up. “I’ve won nine lotteries, and left one undrawn
when I came away, because it did not seem likely to
fill. Let me see,” said he, emptying his pockets,—”there
is the beautiful rosewood box that I won, ven you was
there; the next was a set of crimping-irons, vich I von
also; the third was a jockey-vip, which I did not want
and only stood one ticket for and lost; the fourth was
this elegant box, with a view of Margate on the lid;
then came these six sherry labels with silver rims; a
snuff-box with an inwisible mouse; a coral rattle with
silver bells; a silk yard measure in a walnut-shell; a
couple of West India beetles; a humming-bird in a
glass case, which I lost; and then these dozen bodkins
with silver eyes—so that altogether I have made a
pretty good night’s work of it. Kitey Graves wasn’t
in great force, so after I had sung Bid me Discourse,
and I’d be a Butterfly, I cut my stick and went to the
hopposition shop, where they used me much more
genteelly; giving me three tickets for a song, and introducing
me in more flattering terms to the company—don’t
like being considered one of the nasty ‘reglars,’
and they should make a point of explaining that one
isn’t. Besides, what business had Kitey to say anything
about Bagnigge Vells? a hass!—Now, perhaps, you’ll
favour me with some supper.”

“Certainly,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, patting Jemmy
approvingly on the head—”you deserve some. It’s only
no song, no supper, and you’ve been singing like a
nightingale;” thereupon they set to with vigorous determination.

A bright Sunday dawned, and the beach at an early
hour was crowded with men in dressing-gowns of every
shape, hue, and material, with buff slippers—the “regulation
Margate shoeing,” both for men and women. As
the hour of eleven approached, and the church bells
began to ring, the town seemed to awaken suddenly
from a trance, and bonnets the most superb, and dresses
the most extravagant, poured forth from lodgings the
most miserable. Having shaved and dressed himself
with more than ordinary care and attention, Mr. Jorrocks
walked his friends off to church, assuring them that no
one need hope to prosper throughout the week who did
not attend it on the Sunday, and he marked his own
devotion throughout the service by drowning the clerk’s
voice with his responses. After this spiritual ablution
Mr. Jorrocks bethought himself of having a bodily one
in the sea; and the day being excessively hot, and the
tide about the proper mark, he pocketed a couple of
towels out of his bedroom and went away to bathe,
leaving Green and the Yorkshireman to amuse themselves
at the “White Hart.”

This house, as we have already stated, faces the
harbour, and is a corner one, running a considerable
way up the next street, with a side door communicating,
as well as the front one, with the coffee-room. This
room differs from the generality of coffee-rooms, inasmuch
as the windows range the whole length of the
room, and being very low they afford every facility
for the children and passers-by to inspect the interior.
Whether this is done to show the Turkey carpet, the
pea-green cornices, the bright mahogany slips of tables,
the gay trellised geranium-papered room, or the aristocratic
visitors who frequent it, is immaterial—the description
is as accurate as if George Robins had drawn
it himself. In this room then, as the Yorkshireman and
Green were lying dozing on three chairs apiece, each
having fallen asleep to avoid the trouble of talking to
the other, they were suddenly roused by loud yells and
hootings at the side door, and the bursting into the
coffee-room of what at first brush they thought must
be a bull. The Yorkshireman jumped up, rubbed his
eyes, and lo! before him stood Mr. Jorrocks, puffing
like a stranded grampus, with a bunch of sea-weed
under his arm and the dress in which he had started,
with the exception of the dark blue stocking-net pantaloons,
the place of which were supplied by a flowing
white linen kilt, commonly called a shirt, in the four
corners of which were knotted a few small pebbles—producing,
with the Hessian boots and one thing and
another, the most laughable figure imaginable. The
blood of the Jorrockses was up, however, and throwing
his hands in the air, he thus delivered himself. “Oh
gentlemen! gentlemen!—here’s a lamentable occurrence—a
terrible disaster—oh dear! oh dear!—I never thought
I should come to this. You know, James Green,” appealing
to Jemmy, “that I never was the man to raise a
blush on the cheek of modesty; I have always said that
‘want of decency is want of sense,’ and see how I am
rewarded! Oh dear! oh dear! that I should ever have
trusted my pantaloons out of my sight.” While all this,
which was the work of a moment, was going forward,
the mob, which had been shut out at the side door on
Jorrocks’s entry, had got round to the coffee-room
window, and were all wedging their faces in to have a
sight of him. It was principally composed of children,
who kept up the most discordant yells, mingled with
shouts of “there’s old cutty shirt!”—”who’s got your
breeches, old cock?”—”make a scramble!”—”turn him
out for another hunt!”—”turn him again!”—until,
fearing for the respectability of his house, the landlord
persuaded Mr. Jorrocks to retire into the bar to state
his grievances. It then appeared that having travelled
along the coast, as far as the first preventive stationhouse
on the Ramsgate side of Margate, the grocer
had thought it a convenient place for performing his
intended ablutions, and, accordingly, proceeded to do
what all people of either sex agree upon in such cases—namely
to divest himself of his garments; but before
he completed the ceremony, observing some females
on the cliffs above, and not being (as he said) a man
“to raise a blush on the cheek of modesty,” he advanced
to the water’s edge in his aforesaid unmentionables, and
forgetting that it was not yet high tide, he left them
there, when they were speedily covered, and the pockets
being full of silver and copper, of course they were
“swamped.” After dabbling about in the water and
amusing himself with picking up sea-weed for about
ten minutes, Mr. Jorrocks was horrified, on returning
to the spot where he thought he had left his stocking-net
pantaloons, to find that they had disappeared; and
after a long fruitless search, the unfortunate gentleman
was compelled to abandon the pursuit, and render himself
an object of chase to all the little boys and girls
who chose to follow him into Margate on his return
without them.

Jorrocks, as might be expected, was very bad about
his loss, and could not get over it—it stuck in his
gizzard, he said—and there it seemed likely to remain.
In vain Mr. Creed offered him a pair of trousers—he
never had worn a pair. In vain he asked for the loan of
a pair of white cords and top-boots, or even drab shorts
and continuations. Mr. Creed was no sportsman, and
did not keep any. The bellman could not cry the lost
unmentionables because it was Sunday, and even if
they should be found on the ebbing of the tide, they
would take no end of time to dry. Mr. Jorrocks declared
his pleasure at an end, and forthwith began making
inquiries as to the best mode of getting home. The
coaches were all gone, steamboats there were none,
save for every place but London, and posting, he said,
was “cruelly expensive.” In the midst of his dilemma,
“Boots,” who is always the most intelligent man about
an inn, popped in his curly head, and informed Mr.
Jorrocks that the Unity hoy, a most commodious vessel,
neat, trim, and water-tight, manned by his own maternal
uncle, was going to cut away to London at three o’clock,
and would land him before he could say “Jack Robinson.”
Mr. Jorrocks jumped at the offer, and forthwith
attiring himself in a pair of Mr. Creed’s loose inexpressibles,
over which he drew his Hessian boots, he
tucked the hamper containing the knuckle of veal and
other etceteras under one arm, and the bunch of sea-weed
he had been busy collecting, instead of watching
his clothes, under the other, and, followed by his friends,
made direct for the vessel.

Everybody knows, or ought to know, what a hoy
is—it is a large sailing-boat, sometimes with one deck,
sometimes with none; and the Unity, trading in bulky
goods, was of the latter description, though there was
a sort of dog-hole at the stern, which the master dignified
by the name of a “state cabin,” into which he purposed
putting Mr. Jorrocks, if the weather should turn
cold before they arrived. The wind, however, he said,
was so favourable, and his cargo—”timber and fruit,”
as he described it, that is to say, broomsticks and
potatoes—so light, that he warranted landing him at
Blackwall at least by ten o’clock, where he could either
sleep, or get a short stage or an omnibus on to Leadenhall
Street. The vessel looked anything but tempting,
neither was the captain’s appearance prepossessing, still
Mr. Jorrocks, all things considered, thought he would
chance it; and depositing his hamper and sea-weed, and
giving special instructions about having his pantaloons
cried in the morning—recounting that besides the silver,
and eighteen-pence in copper, there was a steel pencil-case
with “J.J.” on the seal at the top, an anonymous
letter, and two keys—he took an affectionate leave of
his friends, and stepped on board, the vessel was shoved
off and stood out to sea.

Monday morning drew the cockneys from their roosts
betimes, to take their farewell splash and dive in the
sea. As the day advanced, the bustle and confusion on
the shore and in the town increased, and everyone
seemed on the move. The ladies paid their last visits to
the bazaars and shell shops, and children extracted
the last ounce of exertion from the exhausted leg-weary
donkeys. Meanwhile the lords of the creation strutted
about, some in dressing-gowns, others, “full puff,” with
bags and boxes under their arms—while sturdy porters
were wheeling barrows full of luggage to the jetty. The
bell-man went round dressed in a blue and red cloak,
with a gold hatband. Ring-a-ding, ring-a-ding, ring-a-ding,
dong, went the bell, and the gaping cockneys
congregated around. He commenced—”To be sould in
the market-place a quantity of fresh ling.” Ring-a-ding,
ring-a-ding, dong: “The Royal Adelaide, fast and
splendid steam-packet, Capt. Whittingham, will leave
the pier this morning at nine o’clock precisely, and land
the passengers at London Bridge Steam-packet Wharf—fore
cabin fares and children four shillings—saloon five
shillings.” Ring-a-ding, ring-a-ding, dong: “The superb
and splendid steam-packet, the Magnet, will leave the
pier this morning at nine o’clock precisely, and land the
passengers at the St. Catherine Docks—fore-cabin fares
and children four shillings—saloon five shillings.” Ring-a-ding,
ring-a-ding, dong: “Lost at the back of James
Street—a lady’s black silk—black lace wale—whoever
has found the same, and will bring it to the cryer, shall
receive one shilling reward.” Ring-a-ding, ring-a-ding,
dong: “Lost, last night, between the jetty and the York
Hotel, a little boy, as answers to the name of Spot, whoever
has found the same, and will bring him to the
cryer, shall receive a reward of half-a-crown.” Ring-a-ding,
ring-a-ding, dong: “Lost, stolen, or strayed, or
otherwise conveyed, a brown-and-white King Charles’s
setter as answers to the name of Jacob Jones. Whoever
has found the same, or will give such information as
shall lead to the detection and conversion of the offender
or offenders shall be handsomely rewarded.” Ring-a-ding,
ring-a-ding, dong: “Lost below the prewentive sarvice
station by a gentleman of great respectability—a
pair of blue knit pantaloons, containing eighteen penny-worth
of copper—a steel pencil-case—a werry anonymous
letter, and two keys. Whoever will bring the same
to the cryer shall receive a reward.—God save the King!”

Then, as the hour of nine approached, what a concourse
appeared! There were fat and lean, and short
and tall, and middling, going away, and fat and lean,
and short and tall, and middling, waiting to see them
off; Green, as usual, making himself conspicuous, and
canvassing everyone he could lay hold of for the Magnet
steamer. At the end of the jetty, on each side, lay the
Royal Adelaide and the Magnet, with as fierce a contest
for patronage as ever was witnessed. Both decks were
crowded with anxious faces—for the Monday’s steamboat
race is as great an event as a Derby, and a cockney
would as lieve lay on an outside horse as patronise a
boat that was likely to let another pass her. Nay, so
high is the enthusiasm carried, that books are regularly
made on the occasion, and there is as much clamour for
bets as in the ring at Epsom or Newmarket. “Tomkins,
I’ll lay you a dinner—for three—Royal Adelaide against
the Magnet,” bawled Jenkins from the former boat.
“Done,” cries Tomkins. “The Magnet for a bottle of
port,” bawled out another. “A whitebait dinner for
two, the Magnet reaches Greenwich first.” “What should
you know about the Magnet?” inquires the mate of
the Royal Adelaide. “Vy, I think I should know something
about nauticals too, for Lord St. Wincent was my
godfather.” “I’ll bet five shillings on the Royal Adelaide.”
“I’ll take you,” says another. “I’ll bet a bottom of
brandy on the Magnet,” roars out the mate. “Two goes
of Hollands’, the Magnet’s off Herne Bay before the Royal
Adelaide.” “I’ll lay a pair of crimping-irons against five
shillings, the Magnet beats the Royal Adelaide,” bellowed
out Green, who having come on board, had mounted
the paddle-box. “I say, Green, I’ll lay you an even five
if you like.” “Well, five pounds,” cries Green. “No,
shillings,” says his friend. “Never bet in shillings,”
replies Green, pulling up his shirt collar. “I’ll bet fifty
pounds,” he adds,-getting valiant. “I’ll bet a hundred
ponds—a thousand pounds—a million pounds—half the
National Debt, if you like.”

Precisely as the jetty clock finishes striking nine, the
ropes are slipped, and the rival steamers stand out to
sea with beautiful precision, amid the crying, the kissing
of hands, the raising of hats, the waving of handkerchiefs,
from those who are left for the week, while the
passengers are cheered by adverse tunes from the respective
bands on board. The Magnet, having the outside,
gets the breeze first hand, but the Royal Adelaide
keeps well alongside, and both firemen being deeply
interested in the event, they boil up a tremendous
gallop, without either being able to claim the slightest
advantage for upwards of an hour and a half, when the
Royal Adelaide manages to shoot ahead for a few
minutes, amid the cheers and exclamations of her crew.
The Magnet’s fireman, however, is on the alert, and a
few extra pokes of the fire presently bring the boats
together again, in which state they continue, nose and
nose, until the stiller water of the side of the Thames
favours the Magnet, and she shoots ahead amid the
cheers and vociferations of her party, and is not neared
again during the voyage.

This excitement over, the respective crews sink into
a sort of melancholy sedateness, and Green in vain
endeavours to kick up a quadrille. The men were exhausted
and the women dispirited, and altogether they
were a very different set of beings to what they were on
the Saturday. Dull faces and dirty-white ducks were
the order of the day.

The only incident of the voyage was, that on approaching
the mouth of the Medway, the Royal Adelaide was
hailed by a vessel, and the Yorkshireman, on looking
overboard, was shocked to behold Mr. Jorrocks sitting
in the stern of his hoy in the identical position he had
taken up the previous day, with his bunch of sea-weed
under his elbow, and the remains of the knuckle of
veal, ham, and chicken, spread on the hamper before
him. “Stop her?” cried the Yorkshireman, and then
hailing Mr. Jorrocks he holloaed out, “In the name
of the prophet, Figs, what are you doing there?”
“Oh, gentlemen! gentlemen!” exclaimed Mr. Jorrocks,
brightening up as he recognised the boat, “take compassion
on a most misfortunate indiwidual—here have
I been in this ‘orrid ‘oy, ever since three o’clock yesterday
afternoon and here I seem likely to end my days—for
blow me tight if I couldn’t swim as fast as it
goes.” “Look sharp, then,” cried the mate of the
steamer, “and chuck us up your luggage.” Up went
the sea-weed, the hamper, and Mr. Jorrocks; and
before the hoyman awoke out of a nap, into which he
had composed himself on resigning the rudder to his
lad, our worthy citizen was steaming away a mile
before his vessel, bilking him of his fare.

Who does not recognise in this last disaster, the
truth of the old adage?

“Most haste, least speed.”

VIII. THE ROAD: ENGLISH AND FRENCH.

“Jorrocks’s France, in three wolumes, would sound
werry well,” observed our worthy citizen, one afternoon,
to his confidential companion the Yorkshireman, as
they sat in the veranda in Coram Street, eating red
currants and sipping cold whiskey punch; “and I thinks
I could make something of it. They tells me that at
the ‘west end’ the booksellers will give forty pounds
for anything that will run into three wolumes, and one
might soon pick up as much matter as would stretch
into that quantity.”

The above observation was introduced in a long conversation
between Mr. Jorrocks and his friend, relative
to an indignity that had been offered him by the rejection
by the editor of a sporting periodical of a long
treatise on eels, which, independently of the singularity
of diction, had become so attenuated in the handling,
as to have every appearance of filling three whole
numbers of the work; and Mr. Jorrocks had determined
to avenge the insult by turning author on his own
account. The Yorkshireman, ever ready for amusement,
cordially supported Mr. Jorrocks in his views,
and a bargain was soon struck between them, the main
stipulations of which were, that Mr. Jorrocks should
find cash, and the Yorkshireman should procure information.

Accordingly, on the Saturday after, the nine o’clock
Dover heavy drew up at the “Bricklayers’ Arms,”
with Mr. Jorrocks on the box seat, and the Yorkshireman
imbedded among the usual heterogeneous assembly—soldiers,
sailors, Frenchmen, fishermen, ladies’ maids,
and footmen—that compose the cargo of these coaches.
Here they were assailed with the usual persecution from
the tribe of Israel, in the shape of a hundred merchants,
proclaiming the virtues of their wares; one with black-lead
pencils, twelve a shilling, with an invitation to
“cut ’em and try ’em”; another with a good pocket-knife,
“twelve blades and saw, sir”; a third, with a
tame squirrel and a piping bullfinch, that could whistle
God save the King and the White Cockade—to be given
for an old coat. “Buy a silver guard-chain for your
vatch, sir!” cried a dark eyed urchin, mounting the
fore-wheel, and holding a bunch of them in Mr. Jorrocks’s
face; “buy pocket-book, memorandum-book!” whined
another. “Keepsake—Forget-me-not—all the last year’s
annuals at half-price!” “Sponge cheap, sponge! take
a piece, sir—take a piece.” “Patent leather straps.”
“Barcelona nuts. Slippers. Morning Hurl (Herald).
Rhubarb. ‘Andsome dog-collar, sir, cheap!—do to
fasten your wife up with!”

“Stand clear, ye warmints!” cries the coachman,
elbowing his way among them—and, remounting the
box, he takes the whip and reins out of Mr. Jorrocks’s
hands, cries “All right behind? sit tight!” and off
they go.

The day was fine, and the hearts of all seemed light
and gay. The coach, though slow, was clean and smart,
the harness bright and well-polished, while the sleek
brown horses poked their heads about at ease, without
the torture of the bearing-rein. The coachman, like his
vehicle, was heavy, and had he been set on all fours, a
party of six might have eat off his back. Thus they
proceeded at a good steady substantial sort of pace;
trotting on level ground, walking up hills, and dragging
down inclines. Nor among the whole party was there a
murmur of discontent at the pace. Most of the passengers
seemed careless which way they went, so long as they
did but move, and they rolled through the Garden of
England with the most stoical indifference. We know not
whether it has ever struck the reader, but the travellers
by Dover coaches are less captious about pace than
those on most others.

And now let us fancy our friends up, and down,
Shooter’s Hill, through Dartford, Northfleet, and Gravesend—at
which latter place, the first foreign symptom
appears, in words, “Poste aux Chevaux,” on the door-post
of the inn; and let us imagine them bowling down
Rochester Hill at a somewhat amended pace, with the
old castle, by the river Medway, the towns of Chatham,
Strood and Rochester full before them, and the finely
wooded country extending round in pleasing variety of
hill and dale. As they reach the foot of the hill, the
guard commences a solo on his bugle, to give notice to
the innkeeper to have the coach dinner on the table.
All huddled together, inside and out, long passengers
and short ones, they cut across the bridge, rattle along
the narrow street, sparking the mud from the newly-watered
streets on the shop windows and passengers
on each side, and pull up at the “Pig and Crossbow,”
with a jerk and a dash as though they had been travelling
at the rate of twelve miles an hour. Two other coaches
are “dining,” while some few passengers, whose “hour
is not yet come,” sit patiently on the roof, or pace up
and down the street with short and hurried turns,
anxious to see the horses brought out that are to forward
them on their journey. And what a commotion
this new arrival creates! From the arched doorway of
the inn issue two chamber-maids, one in curls the other
in a cap; Boots, with both curls and a cap, and a ladder
in his hand; a knock-kneed waiter, with a dirty duster,
to count noses, while the neat landlady, in a spruce
black silk gown and clean white apron, stands smirking,
smiling, and rubbing her hands down her sides, inveigling
the passengers into the house, where she will turn them
over to the waiters to take their chance the instant she
gets them in. About the door the usual idlers are
assembled.—A coachman out of place, a beggar out at
the elbows, a sergeant in uniform, and three recruits
with ribbons in their hats; a captain with his boots
cut for corns, the coachman that is to drive to Dover,
a youth in a straw hat and a rowing shirt, the little
inquisitive old man of the place—who sees all the midday
coaches change horses, speculates on the passengers
and sees who the parcels are for—and, though last but
not least, Mr. Bangup, the “varmint” man, the height
of whose ambition is to be taken for a coachman. As
the coach pulled up, he was in the bar taking a glass
of cold sherry “without” and a cigar, which latter he
brings out lighted in his mouth, with his shaved white
hat stuck knowingly on one side, and the thumbs of
his brown hands thrust into the arm-holes of his waistcoat,
throwing back his single breasted fancy buttoned
green coat, and showing a cream coloured cravat,
fastened with a gold coach-and-four pin, which, with
a buff waistcoat and tight drab trousers buttoning over
the boot, complete his “toggery,” as he would call it.
His whiskers are large and riotous in the extreme, while
his hair is clipped as close as a charity schoolboy’s. The
coachman and he are on the best of terms, as the outward
twist of their elbows and jerks of the head on
meeting testify. His conversation is short and slangy,
accompanied with the correct nasal twang. After standing
and blowing a few puffs, during which time the
passengers have all alighted, and the coachman has got
through the thick of his business, he takes the cigar
out of his mouth, and, spitting on the flags, addresses
his friend with, “Y’ve got the old near-side leader back
from Joe, I see.” “Yes, Mr. Bangup, yes,” replies his
friend, “but I had some work first—our gov’rnor was
all for the change—at last, says I to our ‘osskeeper, says
I, it arn’t no use your harnessing that ‘ere roan for me
any more, for as how I von’t drive him, so it’s not to
no use harnessing of him, for I von’t be gammon’d out
of my team not by none on them, therefore it arn’t to
never no use harnessing of him again for me.” “So you
did ’em,” observes Mr. Bangup. “Lord bless ye, yes! it
warn’t to no use aggravising about it, for says I, I von’t
stand it, so it warn’t to no manner of use harnessing of
him again for me.” “Come, Smith, what are you chaffing
there about?” inquires the landlord, coming out with
the wide-spread way-bill in his hands, “have you two
insides?” “No, gov’rnor, I has but von, and that’s
precious empty, haw! haw! haw!” “Well, but now get
Brown to blow his horn early, and you help to hurry
the passengers away from my grub, and may be I’ll
give you your dinner for your trouble,” replies the
landlord, reckoning he would save both his meat and
his horses by the experiment. “Ay, there goes the
dinner!” added he, just as Mr. Jorrocks’s voice was
heard inside the “Pig and Crossbow,” giving a most
tremendous roar for his food.—”Pork at the top, and
pork at the bottom,” the host observes to the waiter
in passing, “and mind, put the joints before the women—they
are slow carvers.”

While the foregoing scene was enacting outside, our
travellers had been driven through the passage into a
little, dark, dingy room at the back of the house, with a
dirty, rain-bespattered window, looking against a whitewashed
blank wall. The table, which was covered with
a thrice-used cloth, was set out with lumps of bread,
knives, and two and three pronged forks laid alternately.
Altogether it was anything but inviting, but
coach passengers are very complacent; and on the
Dover road it matters little if they are not. The bustle
of preparation was soon over. Coats No. 1, No. 2, and
No. 3, are taken off in succession, for some people wear
top-coats to keep out the “heat”; chins are released
from their silken jeopardy, hats are hid in corners, and
fur caps thrust into pockets of the owners. Inside
passengers eye outside ones with suspicion, while a
deaf gentleman, who has left his trumpet in the coach,
meets an acquaintance whom he has not seen for seven
years, and can only shake hands and grin to the movements
of the lips of the speaker. “You find it very warm
inside, I should think, sir?” “Thank ye, thank ye, my
good friend; I’m rayther deaf, but I presume you’re
inquiring after my wife and daughters—they are very
well, I thank ye.” “Where will you sit at dinner?”
rejoins the first speaker, in hopes of a more successful
hit. “It is two years since I saw him.” “No; where will
you sit, sir? I said.” “Oh, John? I beg your pardon—I’m
rayther deaf—he’s in Jamaica with his regiment.”
“Come, waiter, BRING DINNER!” roared Mr. Jorrocks,
at the top of his voice, being the identical shout that
was heard outside, and presently the two dishes of pork,
a couple of ducks, and a lump of half-raw, sadly mangled,
cold roast beef, with waxy potatoes and overgrown
cabbages, were scattered along the table. “What a
beastly dinner!” exclaims an inside dandy, in a sable-collared
frock-coat—”the whole place reeks with onions
and vulgarity. Waiter, bring me a silver fork!” “Allow
me to duck you, ma’am?” inquires an outside passenger,
in a facetious tone, of a female in a green silk cloak, as
he turns the duck over in the dish. “Thank you, sir,
but I’ve some pork coming.” “Will you take some of
this thingumbob?” turning a questionable-looking pig’s
countenance over in its pewter bed. “You are in considerable
danger, my friend—you are in considerable
danger,” drawls forth the superfine insider to an outsider
opposite. “How’s that?” inquires the former in
alarm. “Why, you are eating with your knife, and you
are in considerable danger of cutting your mouth”.—What
is the matter at the far end of the table?—a lady
in russet brown, with a black velvet bonnet and a feather,
in convulsions. “She’s choking by Jove! hit her on the
back—gently, gently—she’s swallowed a fish-bone.” “I’ll
lay five to two she dies,” cries Mr. Bolus, the sporting
doctor of Sittingbourne. She coughs—up comes a couple
of tooth-picks, she having drunk off a green glass of
them in mistake.

“Now hark’e, waiter! there’s the guard blowing his
horn, and we have scarcely had a bite apiece,” cries
Mr. Jorrocks, as that functionary sounded his instrument
most energetically in the passage; “blow me tight,
if I stir before the full half-hour’s up, so he may blow
till he’s black in the face.” “Take some cheese, sir?”
inquires the waiter. “No, surely not, some more pork,
and then some tarts”. “Sorry, sir, we have no tarts we
can recommend. Cheese is partiklar good.” [Enter
coachman, peeled down to a more moderate-sized man.]

“Leaves ye here, if you please, sur.” “With all my
heart, my good friend.” “Please to remember the coachman—driv
ye thirty miles.” “Yes, but you’ll recollect
how saucy you were about my wife’s bonnet-box there’s
sixpence between us for you.” “Oh, sur! I’m
sure I didn’t mean no unpurliteness. I ‘opes you’ll
forget it; it was werry aggravising, certainly, but driv
ye thirty miles. ‘Opes you’ll give a trifle more, thirty
miles.” “No, no, no more; so be off.” “Please to remember
the coachman, ma’am, thirty miles!” “Leaves
ye here, sir, if you please; goes no further, sir; thirty
miles, ma’am; all the vay from Lunnun, sir.”

A loud flourish on the bugle caused the remainder
of the gathering to be made in dumb show, and having
exhausted his wind, the guard squeezed through the
door, and, with an extremely red face, assured the company
that “time was hup” and the “coach quite ready.”
Then out came the purses, brown, green, and blue, with
the usual inquiry, “What’s dinner, waiter?” “Two and
six, dinner, beer, three,—two and nine yours,” replied
the knock-kneed caitiff to the first inquirer, pushing a
blue-and-white plate under his nose; “yours is three
and six, ma’am;—two glasses of brandy-and-water,
four shillings, if you please sir—a bottle of real Devonshire
cider.”—”You must change me a sovereign,”
handing one out. “Certainly, sir,” upon which the
waiter, giving it a loud ring upon the table, ran out of
the room. “Now, gentlemen and ladies! pray, come,
time’s hup—carn’t wait—must go”—roars the guard,
as the passengers shuffle themselves into their coats,
cloaks, and cravats, and Joe “Boots” runs up the
passage with the ladder for the lady. “Now, my dear
Mrs. Sprat, good-bye.—God bless you, and remember
me most kindly to your husband and dear little ones
—and pray, write soon,” says an elderly lady, as she
hugs and kisses a youngish one at the door, who has
been staying with her for a week, during which time
they have quarrelled regularly every night. “Have you
all your things, dearest? three boxes, five parcels, an
umbrella, a parasol, the cage for Tommy’s canary, and
the bundle in the red silk handkerchief—then good-bye,
my beloved, step up—and now, Mr. Guard, you know
where to set her down.” “Good-bye, dearest Mrs. Jackson,
all right, thank you,” replies Mrs. Sprat, stepping
up the ladder, and adjusting herself in the gammon
board opposite the guard, the seat the last comer
generally gets.—”But stay! I’ve forgot my reticule—it’s
on the drawers in the bedroom—stop, coachman!
I say, guard!” “Carn’t wait, ma’am—time’s hup”—and
just at this moment a two-horse coach is heard
stealing up the street, upon which the coachman calls
to the horse-keepers to “stand clear with their cloths,
and take care no one pays them twice over,” gives a
whistling hiss to his leaders, the double thong to his
wheelers, and starts off at a trot, muttering something
about, “cuss’d pair-‘oss coach,—convict-looking
passengers,” observing confidentially to Mr. Jorrocks,
as he turned the angle of the street, “that he would
rather be hung off a long stage, than die a natural
death on a short one,” while the guard drowns the
voices of the lady who has left her reticule, and of
the gentleman who has got no change for his sovereign,
in a hearty puff of:

Blithely and merrily, like all coach passengers after
feeding, our party rolled steadily along, with occasional
gibes at those they met or passed, such as telling
waggoners their linch-pins were out; carters’ mates,
there were nice pocket-knives lying on the road; making
urchins follow the coach for miles by holding up shillings
and mock parcels; or simple equestrians dismount in a
jiffy on telling them their horses’ shoes were not all
on “before.” ¹⁹ Towards the decline of the day, Dover
heights appeared in view, with the stately castle guarding
the Channel, which seen through the clear atmosphere
of an autumnal evening, with the French coast conspicuous
in the distance, had more the appearance of a
wide river than a branch of the sea.

Footnote 19: (return) This is more of a hunting-field joke than a road one. “Have
I all my shoes on?” “They are not all on before.”

The coachman mended his pace a little, as he bowled
along the gentle descents or rounded the base of some
lofty hill, and pulling up at Lydden took a glass of soda-water
and brandy, while four strapping greys, with
highly-polished, richly-plated harness, and hollyhocks
at their heads, were put to, to trot the last few miles
into Dover. Paying-time being near, the guard began
to do the amiable—hoped Mrs. Sprat had ridden comfortable;
and the coachman turned to the gentleman
whose sovereign was left behind to assure him he would
bring his change the next day, and was much comforted
by the assurance that he was on his way to Italy for
the winter. As the coach approached Charlton Gate,
the guard flourished his bugle and again struck up
Rule Britannia, which lasted the whole breadth of the
market-place, and length of Snargate Street, drawing
from Mr. Muddle’s shop the few loiterers who yet remained,
and causing Mr. Le Plastrier, the patriotic
moth-impaler, to suspend the examination of the bowels
of a watch, as they rattled past his window.

At the door of the “Ship Hotel” the canary-coloured
coach of Mr. Wright, the landlord, with four piebald
horses, was in waiting for him to take his evening drive,
and Mrs. Wright’s pony phaeton, with a neat tiger in
a blue frock-coat and leathers, was also stationed behind
to convey her a few miles on the London road. Of course
the equipages of such important personages could not
be expected to move for a common stage-coach, consequently
it pulled up a few yards from the door. It is
melancholy to think that so much spirit should have
gone unrewarded, or in other words, that Mr. Wright
should have gone wrong in his affairs.—Mrs. Ramsbottom
said she never understood the meaning of the
term, “The Crown, and Bill of Rights (Wright’s),”
until she went to Rochester. Many people, we doubt
not, retain a lively recollection of the “bill of Wright’s
of Dover.” But to our travellers.

“Now, sir! this be Dover, that be the Ship, I be
the coachman, and we goes no further,” observed the
amphibious-looking coachman, in a pea-jacket and top-boots,
to Mr. Jorrocks, who still kept his seat on the
box, as if he expected, that because they booked people
“through to Paris,” at the coach office in London, that
the vehicle crossed the Channel and conveyed them on
the other side. At this intimation, Mr. Jorrocks clambered
down, and was speedily surrounded by touts and
captains of vessels soliciting his custom. “Bonjour, me
Lor’,” said a gaunt French sailor in ear-rings, and a blue-and-white
jersey shirt, taking off a red nightcap with
mock politeness, “you shall be cross.” “What’s that
about?” inquires Mr. Jorrocks—”cross! what does the
chap mean?” “Ten shillin’, just, me Lor’,” replied the
man. “Cross for ten shillings,” muttered Mr. Jorrocks,
“vot does the Mouncheer mean? Hope he hasn’t picked
my pocket.” “I—you—vill,” said the sailor slowly,
using his fingers to enforce his meaning, “take to
France,” pointing south, “for ten shillin’ in my bateau,
me Lor,” continued the sailor, with a grin of satisfaction
as he saw Mr. Jorrocks began to comprehend him.
“Ah! I twig—you’ll take me across the water.” said
our citizen chuckling at the idea of understanding
French and being called a Lord—”for ten shillings—half-sovereign
in fact.” “Don’t go with him, sir,”
interrupted a Dutch-built English tar; “he’s got nothing
but a lousy lugger that will be all to-morrow in getting
over, if it ever gets at all; and the Royal George, superb
steamer, sails with a King’s Messenger and dispatches
for all the foreign courts at half-past ten, and must be
across by twelve, whether it can or not.” “Please take
a card for the Brocklebank—quickest steamer out of
Dover—wind’s made expressly to suit her, and she can
beat the Royal George like winking. Passengers never
sick in the most uproarious weather,” cried another
tout, running the corner of his card into Mr. Jorrocks’s
eye to engage his attention. Then came the captain of
the French mail-packet, who was dressed much like a
new policeman, with an embroidered collar to his coat,
and a broad red band round a forage cap which he raised
with great politeness, as he entreated Mr. Jorrocks’s
patronage of his high-pressure engine, “vich had beat
a balloon, and vod take him for half less than noting.”
A crowd collected, in the centre of which stood Mr.
Jorrocks perfectly unmoved, with his wig awry and his
carpet-bag under his arm. “Gentlemen,” said he, extending
his right hand, “you seem to me to be desperately
civil—your purliteness appears to know no
bounds—but, to be candid with you, I beg to say that
whoever will carry me across the herring pond cheapest
shall have my custom, so now begin and bid downwards.”
“Nine shillings,” said an Englishman directly—”eight”
replied a Frenchman—”seven and sixpence”—”seven
shillings”—”six and sixpence”—”six shillings”—”five
and sixpence”; at last it came down to five shillings, at
which there were two bidders, the French captain and
the tout of the Royal George,—and Mr. Jorrocks, like
a true born Briton, promised his patronage to the
latter, at which the Frenchmen shrugged up their
shoulders, and burst out a-laughing, one calling him,
“my Lor’ Ros-bif,” and the other “Monsieur God-dem,”
as they walked off in search of other victims.

None but the natives of Dover can tell what the
weather is, unless the wind comes directly off the sea,
and it was not until Mr. Jorrocks proceeded to embark
after breakfast the next morning, that he ascertained
there was a heavy swell on, so quiet had the heights
kept the gambols of Boreas. Three steamers were simmering
into action on the London-hotel side of the harbour,
in one of which—the Royal George—two britzkas and
a barouche were lashed ready for sea, while the custom-house
porters were trundling barrows full of luggage
under the personal superintendence of a little shock-headed
French commissionnaire of Mr. Wright’s in a
gold-laced cap, and the other gentry of the same profession
from the different inns. As the Royal George lay
nearly level with the quay, Mr. Jorrocks stepped on
board without troubling himself to risk his shins among
the steps of a ladder that was considerately thrust into
the place of embarkation; and as soon as he set foot
upon deck, of course he was besieged by the usual
myriad of land sharks. First came Monsieur the Commissionnaire
with his book, out of which he enumerated
two portmanteaus and two carpet-bags, for each of
which he made a specific charge leaving his own gratuity
optional with his employer; then came Mr. Boots to
ask for something for showing them the way; after
him the porter of the inn for carrying their cloaks and
great-coats, all of which Mr. Jorrocks submitted to,
most philosophically, but when the interpreter of the
deaf and dumb ladder man demanded something for
the use of the ladder, his indignation got the better of
him and he exclaimed loud enough to be heard by all
on deck, “Surely you wouldn’t charge a man for what he
has not enjoyed!”

A voyage is to many people like taking an emetic—they
look at the medicine and wish it well over, and
look at the sea and wish themselves well over. Everything
looked bright and gay at Dover—the cliffs seemed
whiter than ever—the sailors had on clean trousers,
and the few people that appeared in the streets were
dressed in their Sunday best. The cart-horses were seen
feeding leisurely on the hills, and there was a placid
calmness about everything on shore, which the travellers
would fain have had extended to the sea. They came
slowly and solemnly upon deck, muffled up in cloaks
and coats, some with their passage money in their hands,
and took their places apparently with the full expectation
of being sick.

The French packet-boat first gave symptoms of animation,
in the shape of a few vigorous puffs from the boiler,
which were responded to by the Royal George, whose
rope was slipped without the usual tinkle of the bell,
and she shot out to sea, closely followed by the Frenchman,
who was succeeded by the other English boat.
Three or four tremendous long protracted dives, each
followed by a majestic rise on the bosom of the waves,
denoted the crossing of the bar; and just as the creaking
of the cordage, the flapping of the sails, and the
nervous quivering of the paddles, as they lost their
hold of the water, were in full vigour, the mate crossed
the deck with a large white basin in his hand, the sight
of which turned the stomachs of half the passengers.
Who shall describe the misery that ensued? The groans
and moans of the sufferers, increasing every minute, as
the vessel heaved and dived, and rolled and creaked,
while hand-basins multiplied as half-sick passengers
caught the green countenance and fixed eye of some
prostrate sufferer and were overcome themselves.

Mr. Jorrocks, what with his Margate trips, and a
most substantial breakfast of beef-steaks and porter,
tea, eggs, muffins, prawns, and fried ham, held out as
long as anybody—indeed, at one time the odds were
that he would not be sick at all; and he kept walking
up and down deck like a true British tar. In one of his
turns he was observed to make a full stop.—Immediately
before the boiler his eye caught a cadaverous-looking
countenance that rose between the top of a blue camlet
cloak, and the bottom of a green travelling-cap, with a
large patent-leather peak; he was certain that he knew
it, and, somehow or other, he thought, not favourably.
The passenger was in that happy mood just debating
whether he should hold out against sickness any longer,
or resign himself unreservedly to its horrors, when Mr.
Jorrocks’s eye encountered his, and the meeting did
not appear to contribute to his happiness. Mr. Jorrocks
paused and looked at him steadily for some seconds,
during which time his thoughts made a rapid cast over
his memory. “Sergeant Bumptious, by gum!” exclaimed
he, giving his thigh a hearty slap, as the deeply indented
pock-marks on the learned gentleman’s face betrayed
his identity. “Sergeant,” said he, going up to him, “I’m
werry ‘appy to see ye—may be in the course of your
practice at Croydon you’ve heard that there are more
times than one to catch a thief.” “Who are you?” inquired
the sergeant with a growl, just at which moment
the boat gave a roll, and he wound up the inquiry by
a donation to the fishes. “Who am I?” replied Mr.
Jorrocks, as soon as he was done, “I’ll soon tell ye that—I’m
Mr. JORROCKS! Jorrocks wersus Cheatum, in fact—now
that you have got your bullying toggery off, I’ll be
‘appy to fight ye either by land or sea.” “Oh-h-h-h!”
groaned the sergeant at the mention of the latter word,
and thereupon he put his head over the boat and paid
his second subscription. Mr. Jorrocks stood eyeing him,
and when the sergeant recovered, he observed with
apparent mildness and compassion, “Now, my dear
sergeant, to show ye that I can return good for evil,
allow me to fatch you a nice ‘ot mutton chop!” “Oh-h-h-h-h!”
groaned the sergeant, as though he would
die. “Or perhaps you’d prefer a cut of boiled beef
with yellow fat, and a dab of cabbage?” an alternative
which was too powerful for the worthy citizen himself—for,
like Sterne with his captive, he had drawn a
picture that his own imagination could not sustain—and,
in attempting to reach the side of the boat, he
cascaded over the sergeant, and they rolled over each
other, senseless and helpless upon deck.

“Mew, mew,” screamed the seagulls;—”creak,
creak,” went the cordage;—”flop, flop,” went the
sails; round went the white basins, and the steward
with the mop; and few passengers would have cared
to have gone overboard, when, at the end of three
hours’ misery, the captain proclaimed that they were
running into still water off Boulogne. This intimation
was followed by the collection of the passage money
by the mate, and the jingling of a tin box by the steward,
under the noses of the party, for perquisites for the crew.
Jorrocks and the sergeant lay together like babes in
the wood until they were roused by this operation,
when, with a parting growl at his companion, Mr.
Jorrocks got up; and though he had an idea in his
own mind that a man had better live abroad all his
life than encounter such misery as he had undergone,
for the purpose of returning to England, he recollected
his intended work upon France, and began to make
his observations upon the town of Boulogne, towards
which the vessel was rapidly steaming. “Not half so
fine as Margate,” said he; “the houses seem all afraid
of the sea, and turn their ends to it instead of fronting
it, except yon great white place, which I suppose is
the baths”; and, taking his hunting telescope out of
his pocket, he stuck out his legs and prepared to make
an observation. “How the people are swarming down
to see us!” he exclaimed. “I see such a load of petticoats—glad
Mrs. J—— ain’t with us; may have some
fun here, I guess. Dear me, wot lovely women! wot
ankles! beat the English, hollow—would give something
to be a single man!” While he made these remarks, the
boat ran up the harbour in good style, to the evident
gratification of the multitude who lined the pier from
end to end, and followed her in her passage. “Ease her!
stop her!” at last cried the captain, as she got opposite
a low wooden guard-house, midway down the port. A
few strokes of the paddles sent her up to the quay, some
ropes were run from each end of the guard-house down
to the boat, within which space no one was admitted
except about a dozen soldiers or custom-house officers—in
green coats, white trousers, black sugar-loaf “caps,”
and having swords by their sides—and some thick-legged
fisherwomen, with long gold ear-rings, to lower
the ladder for disembarkation. The idlers, that is to
say, all the inhabitants of Boulogne, range themselves
outside the ropes on foot, horseback, in carriages, or
anyhow, to take the chance of seeing someone they
know, to laugh at the melancholy looks of those who
have been sick, and to criticise the company, who are
turned into the guarded space like a flock of sheep
before them.

Mr. Jorrocks, having scaled the ladder, gave himself
a hearty and congratulatory shake on again finding
himself on terra firma, and sticking his hat jauntily
on one side, as though he didn’t know what sea-sickness
was, proceeded to run his eye along the spectators
on one side of the ropes; when presently he was heard
to exclaim, “My vig, there’s Thompson! He owes us
a hundred pounds, and has been doing these three
years.” And thereupon he bolted up to a fine looking
young fellow—with mustachios, in a hussar foraging
cap stuck on one side of his head, dressed in a black
velvet shooting-jacket, and with half a jeweller’s shop
about him in the way of chains, brooches, rings and
buttons—who had brought a good-looking bay horse
to bear with his chest against the cords. “Thompson,”
said Mr. Jorrocks, in a firm tone of voice, “how are
you?” “How do ye do, Mister Jorrocks,” drawled out
the latter, taking a cigar from his mouth, and puffing
a cloud of smoke over the grocer’s head. “Well, I’m
werry well, but I should like to have a few moments’
conversation with you.” “Would ye?” said Thompson,
blowing another cloud. “Yes, I would; you remember
that ‘ere little bill you got Simpkins to discount for you
one day when I was absent; we have had it by us a
long time now, and it is about time you were taking it
up.” “You think so, do you, Mister Jorrocks; can’t
you renew it? I’ll give you a draft on Aldgate pump
for the amount.” “Come, none of your funning with
me, I’ve had enough of your nonsense: give me my
pewter, or I’ll have that horse from under you; for
though it has got the hair rubbed off its near knee, it
will do werry well to carry me with the Surrey occasionally.”
“You old fool,” said Thompson, “you forget
where you are; if I could pay you your little bill, do
you suppose I would be here? You can’t squeeze blood
out of a turnip, can ye? But I’ll tell you what, my
covey, if I can’t give you satisfaction in money, you
shall give me the satisfaction of a gentleman, if you
don’t take care what you are about, you old tinker.
By Jove, I’ll order pistols and coffee for two to-morrow
morning at Napoleon’s column, and let the daylight
through your carcass if you utter another syllable about
the bill. Why, now, you stare as Balaam did at his
ass, when he found it capable of holding an argument
with him!”

And true enough, Jorrocks was dumbfounded at this
sort of reply from a creditor, it not being at all in accordance
with the Lex mercatoria, or law of merchants, and
quite unknown on ‘Change. Before, however, he had
time to recover his surprise, all the passengers having
entered the roped area, one of the green-coated gentry
gave him a polite twist by the coat-tail, and with a
wave of the hand and bend of his body, beckoned him
to proceed with the crowd into the guard-house. After
passing an outer room, they entered the bureau by a
door in the middle of a wooden partition, where two
men were sitting with pens ready to enter the names of
the arrivers in ledgers.

“Votre nom et designation?” said one of them to
Mr. Jorrocks—who, with a bad start, had managed to
squeeze in first—to which Mr. Jorrocks shook his head.
“Sare, what’s your name, sare?” inquired the same
personage. “JORROCKS,” was the answer, delivered with
great emphasis, and thereupon the secretary wrote
“Shorrock.” “—Monsieur Shorrock,” said he, looking
up, “votre profession, Monsieur? Vot you are, sare?”
“A grocer,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, which caused a titter
from those behind who meant to sink the shop. “Marchand-Epicier,”
wrote the bureau-keeper. “Quel age
avez-vous, Monsieur? How old you are, sare?” “Two
pound twelve,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, surprised at his
inquisitiveness. “No, sare, not vot monnay you have,
sare, hot old you are, sare.” “Well, two pound twelve,
fifty-two in fact.” Mr. Jorrocks was then passed out,
to take his chance among the touts and commissionaires
of the various hotels, who are enough to pull passengers
to pieces in their solicitations for custom. In Boulogne,
however, no man with money is ever short of friends;
and Thompson having given the hint to two or three
acquaintances as he rode up street, there were no end
of broken-down sportsmen, levanters, and gentlemen
who live on the interest of what they owe other people,
waiting to receive Mr. Jorrocks. The greetings on their
parts were most cordial and enthusiastic, and even
some who were in his books did not hesitate to hail
him; the majority of the party, however, was composed
of those with whom he had at various tunes and places
enjoyed the sports of the field, but whom he had never
missed until they met at Boulogne.

Their inquiries were business-like and familiar:—”are
ye, Jorrocks?” cried one, holding out both
hands. “How are ye, my lad of wax? Do you still play
billiards?—Give you nine, and play you for a Nap.”
“Come to my house this evening, old boy, and take
a hand at whist for old acquaintance sake,” urged the
friend on his left; “got some rare cogniac, and a box of
beautiful Havannahs.” “No, Jorrocks,—dine with me,”
said a third, “and play chicken-hazard.” “Don’t,” said
a fourth, confidentially, “he’ll fleece ye like fun”. “Let
me put your name down to our Pigeon Club; only a
guinea entrance and a guinea subscription—nothing to
a rich man like you.” “Have you any coin to lend on
unexceptionable personal security, with a power of killing
and selling your man if he don’t pay?” inquired
another. “Are they going to abolish the law of arrest?
‘twould be very convenient if they did.” “Will you
discount me a bill at three months?” “Is B—— out of
the Bench yet?” “Who do they call Nodding Homer in
your hunt?” “Oh, gentlemen, gentlemen!” cried Mr.
Jorrocks, “go it gently, go it gently! Consider the day
is ‘ot, I’m almost out of breath, and faint for want of
food. I’ve come all the way from Angle-tear, as we say
in France, and lost my breakfast on the wogaye. Where
is there an inn where I can recruit my famished frame?
What’s this?” looking up at a sign, “‘Done a boar in
a manger,’ what does this mean?—where’s my French
dictionary? I’ve heard that boar is very good to eat.”
“Yes, but this boar is to drink,” said a friend on the
right; “but you must not put up at a house of that
sort; come to the Hôtel d’Orleans, where all the best
fellows and men of consequence go, a celebrated house
in the days of the Boulogne Hunt. Ah, that was the
time, Mr. Jorrocks! we lived like fighting-cocks then;
you should have been among us, such a rollicking set
of dogs! could hunt all day, race maggots and drink
claret all night, and take an occasional by-day with
the hounds on a Sunday. Can’t do that with the Surrey,
I guess. There’s the Hôtel d’Orleans,” pointing to it as
they turned the corner of the street; “splendid house
it is. I’ve no interest in taking you there, don’t suppose
so; but the sun of its greatness is fast setting—there’s
no such shaking of elbows as there used to be—the IOU
system knocked that up. Still, you’ll be very comfortable;
a bit of carpet by your bedside, curtains to your
windows, a pie-dish to wash in, a clean towel every
third day, and as many friends to dine with you as ever
you like—no want of company in Boulogne, I assure
you. Here, Mr. W——,” addressing the innkeeper who
appeared at the door, “this is the very celebrated Mr.
Jorrocks, of whom we have all heard so much,—take
him and use him as you would your own son; and, hark
ye (aside), don’t forget I brought him.”

“Garsoon,” said Jorrocks, after having composed
himself a little during which time he was also composing
a French speech from his dictionary and Madame
de Genlis’s²⁰ Manuel du Voyageur, “A che hora [ora]
si pranza?” looking at the waiter, who seemed
astonished. “Oh, stop!” said he, looking again, “that’s
Italian—I’ve got hold of the wrong column. A quelle
heure dine—hang me if I know how to call this chap—dine
[spelling it], t’on?” “What were you wishing
to say, sir?” inquired the waiter, interrupting his display
of the language. “Wot, do you speak English?”
asked Jorrocks in amazement. “I hope so, sir,” replied
the man, “for I’m an Englishman.” “Then, why the
devil did you not say so, you great lout, instead of
putting me into a sweat this ‘ot day by speaking French
to you?” “Beg pardon, sir, thought you were a Frenchman.”
“Did you, indeed?” said Jorrocks, delighted;
“then, by Jove, I do speak French! Somehow or other
I thought I could, as I came over. Bring me a thundering
beef-steak, and a pint of stout, directly!” The Hôtel
d’Orleans being a regular roast-beef and plum-pudding
sort of house, Mr. Jorrocks speedily had an immense
stripe of tough beef and boiled potatoes placed before
him, in the well-windowed salle à manger, and the day
being fine he regaled himself at a table at an open
window, whereby he saw the smart passers-by, and let
them view him in return.

Footnote 20: (return) For the benefit of our “tarry-at-home” readers, we should
premise that Madame de Genlis’s work is arranged for the
convenience of travellers who do not speak any language but
their own; and it consists of dialogues on different necessary
subjects, with French and Italian translations opposite the
English.

Sunday is a gay day in France, and Boulogne equals
the best town in smartness. The shops are better set
out, the women are better dressed, and there is a
holiday brightness and air of pleasure on every countenance.
Then instead of seeing a sulky husband trudging
behind a pouting wife with a child in her arms, an infallible
sign of a Sunday evening in England, they trip
away to the rural fête champêtre, where with dancing,
lemonade, and love, they pass away the night in temperate
if not innocent hilarity. “Happy people! that
once a week, at least, lay down their cares, and dance
and sing, and sport away the weights of grievance,
which bow down the spirit of other nations to the earth.”

The voyage, though short, commenced a new era in
Mr. Jorrocks’s life, and he entirely forget all about
Sunday and Dover dullness the moment he set foot
on sprightly France, and he no more recollected it was
Sunday, than if such a day had ceased to exist in the
calendar. Having bolted his steak, he gave his Hessians
their usual flop with his handkerchief, combed his
whiskers, pulled his wig straight, and sallied forth,
dictionary in hand, to translate the signs, admire the
clever little children talking French, quiz the horses,
and laugh at everything he didn’t understand; to
spend his first afternoon, in short, as nine-tenths of
the English who go “abroad” are in the habit of doing.

Early the next morning. Mr. Jorrocks and the Yorkshireman,
accompanied by the commissionnaire of the
Hôtel d’Orleans, repaired to the upper town, for the
purpose of obtaining passports, and as they ascended
the steep street called La grand Rue, which connects
the two towns, they held a consultation as to what the
former should be described. A “Marchand-Epicier”
would obtain Mr. Jorrocks no respect, but, then, he
objected to the word “Rentier.” “What is the French
for fox-‘unter?” said he, after a thoughtful pause,
turning to his dictionary. There was no such word.
“Sportsman, then? Ay, Chasseur! how would that
read? John Jorrocks, Esq., Chasseur,—not bad, I think,”
said he. “That will do,” replied the Yorkshireman, “but
you must sink the Esquire now, and tack ‘Monsieur’
before your name, and a very pretty euphonious sound
‘Monsieur Jorrocks’ will have; and when you hear some
of the little Parisian grisettes lisp it out as you turn the
garters over on their counters, while they turn their
dark flashing eyes over upon you, it will be enough to
rejuvenate your old frame. But suppose we add to
‘Chasseur’—’Member of the Surrey Hunt?'” “By all
means,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, delighted at the idea,
and ascending the stairs of the Consulate three steps
at a time.

The Consul, Mons. De Horter, was in attendance
sitting in state, with a gendarme at the door and his
secretary at his elbow. “Bonjour, Monsieur,” said he,
bowing, as Mr. Jorrocks passed through the lofty folding
door; to which our traveller replied, “The top of
the morning to you, sir,” thinking something of that
sort would be right. The Consul, having scanned him
through his green spectacles, drew a large sheet of thin
printed paper from his portfolio, with the arms of France
placed under a great petticoat at the top, and proceeded
to fill up a request from his most Christian
Majesty to all the authorities, both civil and military,
of France, and also of all the allied “pays,” “de laisser
librement passer” Monsieur John Jorrocks, Chasseur
and member of the Hont de Surrey, and plusieurs other
Honts; and also, Monsieur Stubbs, native of Angleterre,
going from Boulogne to Paris, and to give them aid and
protection, “en cas de besoin,” all of which Mr. Jorrocks
—like many travellers before him—construed into a
most flattering compliment and mark of respect, from
his most Christian Majesty to himself.

Under the word “signalement” in the margin, the
Consul also drew the following sketch of our hero, in
order, as Mr. Jorrocks supposed, that the King of the
Mouncheers might know him when he saw him:

He then handed it over to Mr. Jorrocks for his signature,
who, observing the words “Signature du Porteur”
at the bottom, passed it on to the porter of the inn,
until put right by the Consul, who, on receiving his
fee, bowed him out with great politeness.

Great as had been the grocer’s astonishment at the
horses and carts that he had seen stirring about the
streets, his amazement knew no bounds when the first
Paris diligence came rolling into town with six horses,
spreading over the streets as they swung about in all directions—covered
with bells, sheep-skins, worsted balls, and
foxes’ brushes, driven by one solitary postilion on the
off wheeler. “My vig,” cried he, “here’s Wombwell’s
wild-beast show! What the deuce are they doing in
France? I’ve not heard of them since last Bartlemy-fair,
when I took my brother Joe’s children to see them feed.
But stop—this is full of men! My eyes, so it is! It’s
what young Dutch Sam would call a male coach, because
there are no females about it. Well, I declare, I
am almost sorry I did not bring Mrs. J——. Wot would
they think to see such a concern in Cheapside? Why, it
holds half a township—a perfect willage on wheels.
My eyes, wot a curiosity! Well, I never thought to live
to see such a sight as this!—wish it was going our way
that I might have a ride in it. Hope ours will be as big.”
Shortly after theirs did arrive, and Mr. Jorrocks was
like a perfect child with delight. It was not a male
coach, however, for in the different compartments were
five or six ladies. “Oh, wot elegant creatures,” cried
he, eyeing them; “I could ride to Jerusalem with them
without being tired; wot a thing it is to be a bachelor!”

The Conducteur—with the usual frogged, tagged, embroidered
jacket, and fur-bound cap—having hoisted
their luggage on high, the passengers who had turned
out of their respective compartments to stretch their
legs after their cramping from Calais, proceeded to
resume their places. There were only two seats vacant in
the interior, or, as Mr. Jorrocks called it, the “middle
house,” consequently the Yorkshireman and he crossed
legs. The other four passengers had corner-seats, things
much coveted by French travellers. On Mr. Stubbs’s
right sat an immense Englishman, enveloped in a dark
blue camlet cloak, fastened with bronze lionhead clasps,
a red neckcloth, and a shabby, napless, broad-brimmed,
brown hat. His face was large, round, and red, without
an atom of expression, and his little pig eyes twinkled
over a sort of a mark that denoted where his nose should
have been; in short, his head was more like a barber’s
wig block than anything else, and his outline would
have formed a model of the dome of St. Paul’s. On
the Yorkshireman’s left was a chattering young red-trousered
dragoon, in a frock-coat and flat foraging cap
with a flying tassel. Mr. Jorrocks was more fortunate
than his friend, and rubbed sides with two women; one
was English, either an upper nursery-maid or an under
governess, but who might be safely trusted to travel
by herself. She was dressed in a black beaver bonnet
lined with scarlet silk, a nankeen pelisse with a blue
ribbon, and pea-green boots, and she carried a sort of
small fish-basket on her knee, with a “plain Christian’s
prayer book” on the top. The other was French,
approaching to middle age, with a nice smart plump
figure, good hazel-coloured eyes, a beautiful foot and
ankle, and very well dressed. Indeed, her dress very
materially reduced the appearance of her age, and she
was what the milliners would call remarkably well
“got up.” Her bonnet was a pink satin, with a white
blonde ruche surmounted by a rich blonde veil, with
a white rose placed elegantly on one side, and her glossy
auburn hair pressed down the sides of a milk-white
forehead, in the Madonna style.—Her pelisse was of
“violet-des-bois” figured silk, worn with a black velvet
pelerine and a handsomely embroidered collar. Her
boots were of a colour to match the pelisse; and a
massive gold chain round her neck, and a solitary pearl
ring on a middle finger, were all the jewellery she displayed.
Mr. Jorrocks caught a glimpse of her foot and
ankle as she mounted the steps to resume her place
in the diligence, and pushing the Yorkshireman aside,
he bundled in directly after her, and took up the place
we have described.

The vehicle was soon in motion, and its ponderous
roll enchanted the heart of the grocer. Independently
of the novelty, he was in a humour to be pleased, and
everything with him was couleur de rose. Not so the
Yorkshireman’s right-hand neighbour, who lounged in
the corner, muffled up in his cloak, muttering and cursing
at every jolt of the diligence, as it bumped across the
gutters and jolted along the streets of Boulogne. At
length having got off the pavement, after crushing along
at a trot through the soft road that immediately
succeeds, they reached the little hill near Mr. Gooseman’s
farm, and the horses gradually relaxed into a
walk, when he burst forth with a tremendous oath,
swearing that he had “travelled three hundred thousand
miles, and never saw horses walk up such a bit of a
bank before.” He looked round the diligence in the
expectation of someone joining him, but no one deigned
a reply, so, with a growl and a jerk of his shoulders, he
again threw himself into his corner. The dragoon and
the French lady then began narrating the histories of
their lives, as the French people always do, and Mr.
Jorrocks and the Yorkshireman sat looking at each
other. At length Mr. Jorrocks, pulling his dictionary
and Madame de Genlis out of his pocket, observed, “I
quite forgot to ask the guard at what time we dine—most
important consideration, for I hold it unfair to
takes one’s stomach by surprise, and a man should have
due notice, that he may tune his appetite accordingly.
I have always thought, that there’s as much dexterity
required to bring an appetite to table in the full bloom
of perfection, as there is in training an ‘oss to run on
a particular day.—Let me see,” added he, turning over
the pages of de Genlis—”it will be under the head of
eating and drinking, I suppose.—Here it is—(opens and
reads)—’I have a good appetite—I am hungry—I am
werry hungry—I am almost starved’—that won’t do—’I
have eaten enough’—that won’t do either—’To
breakfast’—no.—But here it is, by Jingo—’Dialogue
before dinner’—capital book for us travellers, this Mrs.
de Genlis—(reads) ‘Pray, take dinner with us to-day, I
shall give you plain fare.’—That means rough and
enough, I suppose,” observed Mr. Jorrocks to the Yorkshireman.—”‘What
time do we dine to-day? French:
A quelle heure dinons-nous aujourd’hui?—Italian: A
che hora (ora) si prancey (pranza) oggi?'” “Ah, Monsieur,
vous parlez Français à merveille,” said the French
lady, smiling with the greatest good nature upon him.
“A marble!” said Mr. Jorrocks, “wot does that mean?”
preparing to look it out in the dictionary. “Ah, Monsieur,
I shall you explain—you speak French like a
natif.” “Indeed!” said Mr. Jorrocks, with a bow, “I
feel werry proud of your praise; and your English is
quite delightful.—By Jove,” said he to the Yorkshireman,
with a most self-satisfied grin, “you were right
in what you told me about the gals calling me Monsieur.—I
declare she’s driven right home to my ‘art—transfixed
me at once, in fact.”

Everyone who has done a little “voyaging,” as they
call it in France, knows that a few miles to the south of
Samer rises a very steep hill, across which the route
lies, and that diligence travellers are generally invited
to walk up it. A path which strikes off near the foot of
the hill, across the open, cuts off the angle, and—diligences
being anything but what the name would imply,—the
passengers, by availing themselves of the short
cut, have ample time for striking up confabs, and inquiring
into the comforts of the occupiers of the various
compartments. Our friends of the “interior” were all
busy jabbering and talking—some with their tongues,
others with their hands and tongues—with the exception
of the monster in the cloak, who sat like a sack in the
corner, until the horses, having reached the well-known
breathing place, made a dead halt, and the conducteur
proceeded to invite the party to descend and “promenade”
up the hill. “What’s happened now?” cried
the monster, jumping up as the door opened; “surely,
they don’t expect us to walk up this mountain! I’ve
travelled three hundred thousand miles, and was never
asked to do such a thing in all my life before. I won’t
do it; I paid for riding, and ride I will. You are all a set
of infamous cheats,” said he to the conducteur in good
plain English; but the conducteur, not understanding
the language, shut the door as soon as all the rest were
out, and let him roll on by himself. Jorrocks stuck to
his woman, who had a negro boy in the rotonde, dressed
in baggy slate-coloured trousers, with a green waistcoat
and a blue coat, with a coronet on the button,
who came to hand her out, and was addressed by the
heroic name of “Agamemnon.” Jorrocks got a glimpse
of the button, but, not understanding foreign coronets,
thought it was a crest; nevertheless, he thought he might
as well inquire who his friend was, so, slinking back as
they reached the foot of the hill he got hold of the nigger,
and asked what they called his missis. Massa did not
understand, and Mr. Jorrocks, sorely puzzled how to
explain, again had recourse to the Manuel du Voyageur;
but Madame de Genlis had not anticipated such an
occurrence, and there was no dialogue adapted to his
situation. There was a conversation with a lacquey,
however, commencing with—”Are you disposed to enter
into my service?” and, in the hopes of hitting upon
something that would convey his wishes, he “hark’d
forward,” and passing by—”Are you married?” arrived
at—”What is your wife’s occupation?” “Que fait votre
femme?” said he, suiting the action to the word, and
pointing to Madame. Agamemnon showed his ivories,
as he laughed at the idea of Jorrocks calling his mistress
his wife, and by signs and words conveyed to him some
idea of the importance of the personage to whom he
alluded. This he did most completely, for before the
diligence came up, Jorrocks pulled the Yorkshireman
aside, and asked if he was aware that they were travelling
with a real live Countess; “Madame la Countess Benwolio,
the nigger informs me,” said he; “a werry grande
femme, though what that means I don’t know.” “Oh,
Countesses are common enough here,” replied the Yorkshireman.
“I dare say she’s a stay-maker. I remember
a paint-maker who had a German Baron for a colour-grinder
once.” “Oh,” said Jorrocks, “you are jealous—you
always try to run down my friends; but that
won’t do, I’m wide awake to your tricks”; so saying,
he shuffled off, and getting hold of the Countess, helped
Agamemnon to hoist her into the diligence. He was most
insinuating for the next two hours, and jabbered about
love and fox-hunting, admiring the fine, flat, open
country, and the absence of hedges and flints; but as
neither youth nor age can subsist on love alone, his
confounded appetite began to trouble him, and got
quite the better of him before they reached Abbeville.
Every mile seemed a league, and he had his head out
of the window at least twenty times before they came
in sight of the town. At length the diligence got its
slow length dragged not only to Abbeville, but to the
sign of the “Fidèle Berger”—or “Fiddle Burgur,” as
Mr. Jorrocks pronounced it—where they were to dine.
The door being opened, out he jumped, and with his
Manuel du Voyageur in one hand, and the Countess
Benvolio in the other, he pushed his way through the
crowd of “pauvres misérables” congregated under the
gateway, who exhibited every species of disease and infirmity
that poor human nature is liable or heir to, and
entered the hotel. The “Sally manger,” as he called it,
was a long brick-floored room on the basement, with a
white stove at one end, and the walls plentifully decorated
with a panoramic view of the Grand Nation
wallopping the Spaniards at the siege of Saragossa.
The diligence being a leetle behind time as usual, the
soup was on the table when they entered. The passengers
quickly ranged themselves round, and, with his mouth
watering as the female garçon lifted the cover from the
tureen, Mr. Jorrocks sat in the expectation of seeing
the rich contents ladled into the plates. His countenance
fell fifty per cent as the first spoonful passed before
his eyes.—”My vig, why it’s water!” exclaimed he—”water,
I do declare, with worms²¹ in it—I can’t eat
such stuff as that—it’s not man’s meat—oh dear, oh
dear, I fear I’ve made a terrible mistake in coming to
France! Never saw such stuff as this at Bleaden’s or
Birch’s, or anywhere in the city.” “I’ve travelled three
hundred thousand miles,” said the fat man, sending his
plate from him in disgust, “and never tasted such a
mess as this before.” “I’ll show them up in The Times,”
cried Mr. Jorrocks; “and, look, what stuff is here—beef
boiled to rags!—well, I never, no never, saw anything
like this before. Oh, I wish I was in Great Coram
Street again!—I’m sure I can’t live here—I wonder if
I could get a return chaise—waiter—garsoon—cuss! Oh
dear! I see Madame de Genlis is of no use in a pinch—and
yet what a dialogue here is! Oh heavens! grant
your poor Jorrocks but one request, and that is the
contents of a single sentence. ‘I want a roasted or boiled
leg of mutton, beef, hung beef, a quarter of mutton,
mutton chops, veal cutlets, stuffed tongue, dried tongue,
hog’s pudding, white sausage, meat sausage, chicken
with rice, a nice fat roast fowl, roast chicken with cressy,
roast or boiled pigeon, a fricassee of chicken, sweet-bread,
goose, lamb, calf’s cheek, calf’s head, fresh pork,
salt pork, cold meat, hash.’—But where’s the use of
titivating one’s appetite with reading of such luxteries?
Oh, what a wife Madame de Genlis would have made
for me! Oh dear, oh dear, I shall die of hunger, I see
—I shall die of absolute famine—my stomach thinks
my throat’s cut already!” In the height of his distress
in came two turkeys and a couple of fowls, and his
countenance shone forth like an April sun after a shower.
“Come, this is better,” said he; “I’ll trouble you, sir,
for a leg and a wing, and a bit of the breast, for I’m
really famished—oh hang! the fellow’s a Frenchman,
and I shall lose half the day in looking it out in my
dictionary. Oh dear, oh dear, where’s the dinner dialogue!—well,
here’s something to that purpose. ‘I will
send you a bit of this fowl.’ ‘A little bit of the fowl
cannot hurt you.’—No, nor a great bit either.—’Which
do you like best, leg or wing?’ ‘Qu’aimez-vous le mieux,
la cuisse ou l’aile?'” Here the Countess Benvolio, who
had been playing a good knife and fork herself, pricked
up her ears, and guessing at Jorrocks’s wants, interceded
with her countryman and got him a plateful of
fowl. It was soon disposed of, however, and half a dish
of hashed hare or cat, that was placed within reach of
him shortly after, was quickly transferred into his plate.
A French dinner is admirably calculated for leading
the appetite on by easy stages to the grand consummation
of satiety. It begins meagrely, as we have shown,
and proceeds gradually through the various gradations
of lights, savories, solids, and substantiate. Presently
there was a large dish of stewed eels put on. “What’s
that?” asked Jorrocks of the man.—”Poisson,” was the
reply. “Poison! why, you infidel, have you no conscience?”
“Fishe,” said the Countess. “Oh, ay, I smell—eels—just
like what we have at the Eel-pie-house
at Twickenham—your ladyship, I am thirsty—’ge soif,’
in fact.” “Ah, bon!” said the Countess, laughing, and
giving him a tumbler of claret. “I’ve travelled three
hundred thousand miles,” said the fat man, “and never
saw claret drunk in that way before.” “It’s not werry
good, I think,” said Mr. Jorrocks, smacking his lips; “if
it was not claret I would sooner drink port.” Some wild
ducks and fricandeau de veau which followed, were cut
up and handed round, Jorrocks helping himself plentifully
to both, as also to pommes de terre à la maitre
d’hôtel, and bread at discretion. “Faith, but this is not
a bad dinner, after all’s said and done, when one gets
fairly into it.” “Fear it will be very expensive,” observed
the fat man. Just when Jorrocks began to think he had
satisfied nature, in came a roast leg of mutton, a beef-steak,
“à la G—d-dam”, ²² and a dish of larks and snipes.

Footnote 21: (return) Macaroni soup.

Footnote 22: (return) When the giraffe mania prevailed in Paris, and gloves, handkerchiefs,
gowns, reticules, etc. were “à la Giraffe,” an Englishman
asked a waiter if they had any beef-steaks “à la Giraffe.”
“No, monsieur, but we have them à la G—d-dem,” was the
answer.

“Must have another tumbler of wine before I can grapple
with these chaps,” said he, eyeing them, and looking
into Madame de Genlis’s book: “‘Garsoon, donnez-moi
un verre de vin,'” holding up the book and pointing to
the sentence. He again set to and “went a good one”
at both mutton and snipes, but on pulling up he appeared
somewhat exhausted. He had not got through it all yet,
however. Just as he was taking breath, a garçon entered
with some custards and an enormous omelette soufflée,
whose puffy brown sides bagged over the tin dish that
contained it. “There’s a tart!” cried Mr. Jorrocks;
“Oh, my eyes, what a swell!—Well, I suppose I must
have a shy at it.—’In for a penny in for a pound!’ as
we say at the Lord Mayor’s feed. Know I shall be sick,
but, however, here goes,” sending his plate across the
table to the garçon, who was going to help it. The first
dive of the spoon undeceived him as he heard it sound
at the bottom of the dish. “Oh lauk, what a go! All
puff, by Jove!—a regular humbug—a balloon pudding,
in short! I won’t eat such stuff—give it to Mouncheer
there,” rejecting the offer of a piece. “I like the solids;—will
trouble you for some of that cheese, sir, and
don’t let it taste of the knive. But what do they mean
by setting the dessert on before the cloth is removed?
And here comes tea and coffee—may as well have some,
I suppose it will be all the same price. And what’s this?”
eyeing a lot of liqueur glasses full of eau de vie. “Chasse-café,
Monsieur,” said the garçon. “Chasse calf—chasse
calf—what’s that? Oh, I twig—what we call ‘shove in
the mouth’ at the Free-and-Easy. Yes, certainly, give
me a glass.” “You shall take some dessert,” said the
Countess, handing him over some peaches and biscuits.
“Well, I’ll try my hand at it, if it will oblege your
ladyship, but I really have had almost enough.” “And
some abricot,” said she, helping him to a couple of fine
juicy ones. “Oh, thank you, my lady, thank you, my
lady, I’m nearly satisfied.” “Vous ne mangez pas,”
said she, giving him half a plate of grapes. “Oh, my
lady, you don’t understand me—I can’t eat any more—I
am regularly high and dry—chock full—bursting,
in fact.” Here she handed him a plate of sponge-cakes
mixed with bon-bons and macaroons, saying, “Vous
êtes un pauvre mangeur—vous ne mangez rien, Monsieur.”
“Oh dear, she does not understand me, I see.—Indeed,
my lady, I cannot eat any more.—Ge woudera,
se ge could-era, mais ge can-ne-ra pas!” “Well,
now, I’ve travelled three hundred thousand miles, and
never heard such a bit of French as that before,” said
the fat man, chuckling.

IX. MR. JORROCKS IN PARIS

As the grey morning mist gradually dispersed, and
daylight began to penetrate the cloud that dimmed
the four squares of glass composing the windows of
the diligence, the Yorkshireman, half-asleep and half-awake,
took a mental survey of his fellow-travellers.—Before
him sat his worthy friend, snoring away with
his mouth open, and his head, which kept bobbing over
on to the shoulder of the Countess, enveloped in the
ample folds of a white cotton nightcap.—She, too, was
asleep and, disarmed of all her daylight arts, dozed
away in tranquil security. Her mouth also was open,
exhibiting rather a moderate set of teeth, and her
Madonna front having got a-twist, exposed a mixture
of brown and iron-grey hairs at the parting place. Her
bonnet swung from the roof of the diligence, and its
place was supplied by a handsome lace cap, fastened
under her chin by a broad-hemmed cambric handkerchief.
Presently the sun rose, and a bright ray shooting
into the Countess’s corner, awoke her with a start, and
after a hurried glance at the passengers, who appeared
to be all asleep, she drew a small ivory-cased looking-glass
from her bag, and proceeded to examine her
features. Mr. Jorrocks awoke shortly after, and with
an awful groan exclaimed that his backbone was fairly
worn out with sitting. “Oh dear!” said he, “my behind
aches as if I had been kicked all the way from Hockleyhole
to Marylebone. Are we near Paris? for I’m sure
I can’t find seat any longer, indeed I can’t. I’d rather
ride two hundred miles in nine hours, like H’osbaldeston,
than be shut up in this woiture another hour. It really
is past bearing, and that’s the long and short of the
matter.” This exclamation roused all the party, who
began yawning and rubbing their eyes and looking at
their watches. The windows also were lowered to take
in fresh air, and on looking out they found themselves
rolling along a sandy road, lined on each side with apple-trees,
whose branches were “groaning” with fruit. They
breakfasted at Beaumont, and had a regular spread of
fish, beef-steak, mutton-chops, a large joint of hot
roast veal, roast chickens, several yards of sour bread,
grapes, peaches, pears, and plums, with vin ordinaire,
and coffee au lait; but Mr. Jorrocks was off his feed,
and stood all the time to ease his haunches.

Towards three in the afternoon they caught the first
glimpse of the gilded dome of the Hospital of Invalids,
which was a signal for all the party to brush up and
make themselves agreeable. Even the three-hundred-thousand
miler opened out, and began telling some
wonderful anecdotes, while the Countess and Mr.
Jorrocks carried on a fierce flirtation, or whatever
else they pleased to call it. At last, after a deal of
jargon, he broke off by appealing to the Yorkshireman
to know what “inn” they should “put up at” in Paris.
“I don’t know, I’m sure,” said he; “it depends a good
deal upon how you mean to live. As you pay my shot
it does not do for beggars to be choosers; but suppose
we try Meurice’s” “Oh no,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, “her
ladyship tells me it is werry expensive, for the English
always pay through the nose if they go to English houses
in Paris; and, as we talk French, we can put up at a
French one, you know.” “Well, then, we can try one
of the French ones in the Rue de la Paix.” “Rue de la
Pay! no, by Jove, that won’t do for me—the werry
name is enough—no Rue de la Pay for me, at least if
I have to pay the shot.” “Well, then, you must get
your friend there to tell you of some place, for I don’t
care twopence, as long as I have a bed, where it is.”
The Countess and he then laid their heads together
again, and when the diligence stopped to change horses
at St. Denis, Mr. Jorrocks asked the Yorkshireman to
alight, and taking him aside, announced with great glee
that her ladyship, finding they were strangers in the
land, had most kindly invited them to stay with her,
and that she had a most splendid house in the Rue des
Mauvais-Garçons, ornamented with mirrors, musical
clocks, and he didn’t know what, and kept the best
company in all France, marquesses, barons, viscounts,
authors, etc. Before the Yorkshireman had time to
reply, the conducteur came and hurried them back
into the diligence, and closed the door with a bang,
to be sure of having his passengers there while he and
the postilion shuffled the cards and cut for a glass of
eau-de-vie apiece.

The Countess, suspecting what they had been after,
resumed the conversation as soon as Mr. Jorrocks was
seated.—”You shall manger cinque fois every day,” said
she; “cinque fois,” she repeated.—”Humph!” said Mr.
Jorrocks to himself, “what can that mean?—cank four—four
times five’s twenty—eat twenty times a day—not
possible!” “Oui, Monsieur, cinque fois,” repeated
the Countess, telling the number off on her fingers—”Café
at nine of the matin, déjeuner à la fourchette
at onze o’clock, diner at cinque heure, café at six hour,
and souper at neuf hour.” “Upon my word,” replied
Mr. Jorrocks, his eyes sparkling with pleasure, “your
offer is werry inwiting. My lady,” said he, bowing before
her, “Je suis—I am much flattered.” “And, Monsieur?”
said she, looking at the Yorkshireman. He, too, assured
her that he was very much flattered, and was beginning
to excuse himself, when the Countess interrupted him
somewhat abruptly by turning to Mr. Jorrocks and
saying, “He sall be your son—n’est ce pas?”
“No, my lady, I’ve no children,” replied he, and the
Countess’s eyes in their turn underwent a momentary
illumination.

The Parisian barrier was soon reached, and the man
taken up to kick about the jaded travellers’ luggage at
the journey’s end. While this operation was going on
in the diligence yard, the Countess stuck close to Mr.
Jorrocks, and having dispatched Agamemnon for a
fiacre, bundled him in, luggage and all, and desiring
her worthy domestic to mount the box, and direct the
driver, she kissed her hand to the Yorkshireman, assuring
him she would be most happy to see him, in proof of
which, she drove away without telling him her number,
or where the Rue des Mauvais-Garçons was.

Paris is a charming place after the heat of the summer
has passed away, and the fine, clear, autumnal days
arrive. Then is the time to see the Tuileries gardens
to perfection, when the Parisians have returned from
their châteaus, and emigrating English and those homeward
bound halt to renovate on the road; then is the
time that the gayest plants put forth their brightest
hues, and drooping orange flowers scent the air which
silvery fountains lend their aid to cool.

On a Sunday afternoon, such as we have described,
our friend Mr. Stubbs (who since his arrival had been
living very comfortably at the Hôtel d’Hollande, in
expectation of Mr. Jorrocks paying his bill) indulged
in six sous’ worth of chairs—one to sit upon and one
for each leg—and, John Bull-like, stretched himself
out in the shade beneath the lofty trees, to view the
gay groups who promenaded the alleys before him. First,
there came a helmeted cuirassier, with his wife in blue
satin, and a little boy in his hand in uniform, with a
wooden sword, a perfect miniature of the father; then
a group of short-petticoated, shuffling French women,
each with an Italian greyhound in slips, followed by
an awkward Englishman with a sister on each arm, all
stepping out like grenadiers; then came a ribbon’d
chevalier of the Legion of Honour, whose hat was
oftener in his hand than on his head, followed by a
nondescript looking militaire with fierce mustachios, in
shining jack-boots, white leathers, and a sort of Italian
military cloak, with one side thrown over the shoulder,
to exhibit the wearer’s leg, and the bright scabbard of
a large sword, while on the hero’s left arm hung a
splendidly dressed woman. “What a figure!” said the
Yorkshireman to himself, as they came before him, and
he took another good stare.—”Yet stay—no, impossible!—Gracious
Heaven! it can’t be—and yet it is—by
Jove, it’s Jorrocks!”

“Why now, you old imbecile,” cried he, jumping off
his chairs and running up to him, “What are you after?”
bursting into a loud laugh as he looked at Mr. Jorrocks’s
mustachios (a pair of great false ones). “Is there no piece
of tomfoolery too great for you? What’s come across
you now? Where the deuce did you get these things?”
taking hold of the curls at one side of his mustachios.

“How now?” roared Mr. Jorrocks with rage and
astonishment. “How now! ye young scaramouch, vot
do you mean by insulting a gentleman sportsman in
broad daylight, in the presence of a lady of quality?
By Jingo,” added he, his eyes sparkling with rage, “if
you are not off before I can say ‘dumpling’ I’ll run you
through the gizzard and give your miserable carcass to
the dogs,” suiting the action to the word, and groping
under his cloak for the hilt of his sword.—A crowd
collected, and the Yorkshireman perceiving symptoms
of a scene, slunk out of the mêlée, and Mr. Jorrocks,
after an indignant shake or two of his feathers and curl
of his mustachios, pursued his course up the gardens.

This was the first time they had met since their
arrival, which was above a week before; indeed, it was
nine days, for the landlord of the house where the Yorkshireman
lived had sent his “little bill” two days before
this, it being an established rule of his house, and one
which was conspicuously posted in all the rooms, that
the bills were to be settled weekly; and Mr. Stubbs
had that very morning observed that the hat of Monsieur
l’Hote was not raised half so high from his head, nor
his body inclined so much towards the ground as it
was wont to be—a pretty significant hint that he
wanted his cash.—Now the Yorkshireman, among his
other accomplishments, had a turn for play, and unfortunately
had been at the Salon the night before,
when, after continuous run of ill-luck, he came away
twelve francs below the amount of the hotel-keeper’s
bill, consequently a rumpus with Mr. Jorrocks could
not have taken place at a more unfortunate moment.
Thinking, however, a good night’s rest or two might
settle him down, and put all matters right, he let things
alone until the Tuesday following, when again finding
Monsieur’s little “memoire” on one side of his coffeecup,
and a framed copy of the “rules and regulations”
of the house on the other, he felt constrained to take
some decisive step towards its liquidation. Accordingly,
having breakfasted, he combed his hair straight over
his face, and putting on a very penitential look, called
a cab, and desired the man to drive him to the Rue
des Mauvais-Garçons.—After zigzagging, twisting, and
turning about in various directions, they at last jingled
to the end of a very narrow dirty-looking street, whose
unswept pavement had not been cheered by a ray of
sunshine since the houses were built. It was excessively
narrow, and there were no flags on either side; but
through the centre ran a dribbling stream, here and
there obstructed by oyster-shells, or vegetable refuse,
as the water had served as a plaything for children, or
been stopped by servants for domestic purposes. The
street being extremely old, of course the houses were
very large, forming, as all houses do in Paris, little
squares entered by folding doors, at one side of which,
in a sort of lodge, lives the Porter—”Parlez au Portier”—who
receives letters, parcels, and communications for
the several occupiers, consisting sometimes of twenty
or thirty different establishments in one house. From
this functionary may be learned the names of the
different tenants. Having dismissed his cab, the Yorkshireman
entered the first gateway on his left, to take
the chance of gaining some intelligence of the Countess.
The Porter—a cobbler by trade—was hammering away,
last on knee, at the sole of a shoe, and with a grin on
his countenance, informed the Yorkshireman that the
Countess lived next door but one. A thrill of fear came
over him on finding himself so near the residence of
his indignant friend, but it was of momentary duration,
and he soon entered the courtyard of No. 3—where he
was directed by an unshaved grisly-looking porter, to
proceed “un troisième,” and ring the bell at the door
on the right-hand side. Obedient to his directions, the
Yorkshireman proceeded to climb a wide but dirty
stone staircase, with carved and gilded balusters, whose
wall and steps had known no water for many years,
and at length found himself on the landing opposite
the very apartment which contained the redoubtable
Jorrocks. Here he stood for a few seconds, breathing
and cooling himself after his exertions, during which
time he pictured to himself the worthy citizen immersed
in papers deeply engaged in the preparation of his
France in three volumes, and wished that the first
five minutes of their interview were over. At length
he mustered courage to grasp a greasy-looking red
tassel, and give a gentle tinkle to the bell. The door
was quickly opened by Agamemnon in dirty loose
trousers and slippers, and without a coat. He recognised
his fellow-traveller, and in answer to his inquiry if
Monsieur Jorrocks was at home, grinned, and answered,
“Oh oui, certainement, Monsieur le Colonel Jorrockes
est ici,” and motioned him to come in. The Yorkshireman
entered the little ante-room—a sort of scullery,
full of mops, pans, dirty shoes, dusters, candlesticks—and
the first thing that caught his eye was Jorrocks’s
sword, which Agamemnon had been burnishing up with
sandpaper and leather, lying on a table before the
window. This was not very encouraging, but Agamemnon
gave no time for reflection, and opening half a
light salmon-coloured folding door directly opposite the
one by which he entered, the Yorkshireman passed
through, unannounced and unperceived by Mr. Jorrocks
or the Countess, who were completely absorbed in a
game of dominoes, sitting on opposite sides of a common
deal table, whose rose-coloured silk cover was laid over
the back of a chair. Jorrocks was sitting on a stool with
his back to the door, and the Countess being very intent
on the game, Mr. Stubbs had time for a hasty survey
of the company and apartment before she looked up.
It was about one o’clock, and of course she was still
en déshabillé, with her nightcap on, a loose robe de
chambre of flannel, and a flaming broad-striped red-and-black
Scotch shawl thrown over her shoulders, and
swan’s-down-lined slippers on her feet. Mr. Jorrocks
had his leather pantaloons on, with a rich blue and
yellow brocade dressing-gown, and blue morocco slippers
to match. His jack-boots, to which he had added a pair
of regimental heel-spurs, were airing before a stove,
which contained the dying embers of a small log. The
room was low, and contained the usual allowance of
red figured velvet-cushioned chairs, with brass nails;
the window curtains were red-and-white on rings and
gilded rods; a secretaire stood against one of the walls,
and there was a large mirror above the marble mantelpiece,
which supported a clock surmounted by a flying
Cupid, and two vases of artificial flowers covered with
glass, on one of which was placed an elegant bonnet
of the newest and most approved fashion. The floor,
of highly polished oak, was strewed about with playbills,
slippers, curl-papers, boxes, cards, dice, ribbons,
dirty handkerchiefs, etc.; and on one side of the deal
table was a plate containing five well-picked mutton-chop
bones, and hard by lay Mr. Jorrocks’s mustachios
and a dirty small tooth-comb.

Just as the Yorkshireman had got thus far in his
survey, the Countess gave the finishing stroke to the
game, and Mr. Jorrocks, jumping up in a rage, gave
his leathers such a slap as sent a cloud of pipe-clay
flying into his face. “Vous avez the devil’s own luck”;
exclaimed he, repeating the blow, when, to avoid the
cloud, he turned short round, and encountered the
Yorkshireman.

“How now?” roared he at the top of his voice, “who
sent for you? Have you come here to insult me in my
own house? I’ll lay my soul to an ‘oss-shoe, I’ll be too
many for ye! Where’s my sword?”

“Now, my good Mr. Jorrocks,” replied the Yorkshireman
very mildly, “pray, don’t put yourself into
a passion—consider the lady, and don’t let us have
any unpleasantness in Madame la Duchesse Benvolio’s
house,” making her a very low bow as he spoke, and
laying his hand on his heart.

“D—n your displeasancies!” roared Jorrocks, “and
that’s swearing—a thing I’ve never done since my
brother Joe fobbed me of my bottom piece of muffin.
Out with you, I say! Out with ye! you’re a nasty dirty
blackguard; I’m done with you for ever. I detest the
sight of you and hate ye afresh every time I see you!”

“Doucement, mon cher Colonel,” interposed the
Countess, “ve sall play anoder game, and you sall had
von better chance,” clapping him on the back as she
spoke. “I von’t!” bellowed Jorrocks. “Turn this chap
out first. I’ll do it myself. H’Agamemnon! H’Agamemnon!
happortez my sword! bring my sword! tout suite,
directly!”

“Police! Police! Police!” screamed the Countess out
of the window; “Police! Police! Police!” bellowed
Agamemnon from the next one; “Police! Police!
Police!” re-echoed the grisly porter down below; and
before they had time to reflect on what had passed, a
sergeant’s file of the National Guard had entered the
hotel, mounted the stairs, and taken possession of the
apartment. The sight of the soldiers with their bright
bayonets, all fixed and gleaming as they were, cooled
Mr. Jorrocks’s courage in an instant, and, after standing
a few seconds in petrified astonishment, he made a
dart at his jack-boots and bolted out of the room. The
Countess Benvolio then unlocked her secretaire, in which
was a plated liqueur-stand with bottles and glasses, out
of which she poured the sergeant three, and the privates
two glasses each of pure eau-de-vie, after which Agamemnon
showed them the top of the stairs.

In less than ten minutes all was quiet again, and the
Yorkshireman was occupying Mr. Jorrocks’s stool. The
Countess then began putting things a little in order,
adorned the deal table with the rose-coloured cover—before
doing which she swept off Mr. Jorrocks’s mustachios,
and thrust a dirty white handkerchief and the
small tooth-comb under the cushion of a chair—while
Agamemnon carried away the plate with the bones.
“Ah, le pauvre Colonel,” said the Countess, eyeing the
bones as they passed, “he sall be von grand homme to
eat—him eat toujours—all day long—Oh, him mange
beaucoup—beaucoup—beaucoup. He is von varé amiable
man, bot he sall not be moch patience. I guess he sall
be varé rich—n’est ce pas? have many guinea?—He
say he keep beaucoup des chiens—many dogs for the
hont—he sail be vot dey call rom customer (rum
customer) in Angleterre, I think.”

Thus she went rattling on, telling the Yorkshireman
all sorts of stories about the pauvre Colonel, whom she
seemed ready to change for a younger piece of goods
with a more moderate appetite; and finding Mr. Stubbs
more complaisant than he had been in the diligence, she
concluded by proposing that he should accompany the
Colonel and herself to a soirée-dansante that evening at
a friend of hers, another Countess, in the “Rue des
Bons-Enfants.”

Being disengaged as usual, he at once assented, on
condition that the Countess would effect a reconciliation
between Mr. Jorrocks and himself, for which purpose
she at once repaired to his room, and presently reappeared
arm-in-arm with our late outrageously indignant
hero. The Colonel had been occupying his time at
the toilette, and was en grand costume—finely cleaned
leathers, jack-boots and brass spurs, with a spick and
span new blue military frock-coat, hooking and eyeing
up to the chin, and all covered with braid, frogs, tags,
and buttons.

“Dere be von beau garçon!” exclaimed the Countess,
turning him round after having led him into the middle
of the room—”dat habit does fit you like vax.” “Yes,”
replied Mr. Jorrocks, raising his arms as though he
were going to take flight, “but it is rather tight—partiklarly
round the waist—shouldn’t like to dine in
it. What do you think of it?” turning round and addressing
the Yorkshireman as if nothing had happened—”suppose
you get one like it?” “Do,” rejoined the
Countess, “and some of the other things—vot you call
them, Colonel?” “What—breeches?” “Yes, breeches—but
the oder name—vot you call dem?” “Oh, leathers?”
replied Mr. Jorrocks. “No, no, another name still.” “I
know no other. Pantaloons, perhaps, you mean?” “No,
no, not pantaloons.” “Not pantaloons?—then I know
of nothing else. You don’t mean these sacks of things,
called trousers?” taking hold of the Yorkshireman’s.
“No, no, not trousers.” “Then really, my lady, I don’t
know any other name.” “Oh, yes, Colonel, you know
the things I intend. Vot is it you call Davil in Angleterre?”
“Oh, we have lots of names for him—Old Nick,
for instance.”—”Old Nick breeches,” said the Countess
thoughtfully; “no, dat sall not be it—vot else?” “Old
Harry?” replied Mr. Jorrocks.—”Old Harry breeches,”
repeated the Countess in the hopes of catching the name
by the ear—”no, nor dat either, encore anoder name,
Colonel.” “Old Scratch, then?” “Old Scratch breeches,”
re-echoed the Countess—”no, dat shall not do.”—”Beelzebub?”
rejoined Mr. Jorrocks. “Beelzebub breeches,”
repeated the Countess—”nor dat.” “Satan, then?” said
Mr. Jorrocks. “Oh oui!” responded the Countess with
delight, “satan! black satan breeches—you shall von
pair of black satan breeches, like the Colonel.”

“And the Colonel will pay for them, I presume?”
said the Yorkshireman, looking at Mr. Jorrocks.

“I carn’t,” said Mr. Jorrocks in an undertone; “I’m
nearly cleaned out, and shall be in Short’s Gardens
before I know where I am, unless I hold better cards
this evening than I’ve done yet. Somehow or other,
these French are rather too sharp for me, and I’ve been
down upon my luck ever since I came.—Lose every
night, in fact, and then they are so werry anxious for
me to have my rewenge, as they call it, that they make
parties expressly for me every evening; but, instead of
getting my rewenge, I only lose more and more money.—They
seem to me always to turn up the king whenever
they want him.—To-night we are going to a Countess’s
of werry great consequence, and, as you know écarté
well, I’ll back your play, and, perhaps, we may do
something between us.”

This being all arranged, Mr. Stubbs took his departure,
and Mr. Jorrocks having girded on his sword,
and the Countess having made her morning toilette,
they proceed to their daily promenade in the Tuileries
Gardens.

A little before nine that evening, the Yorkshireman
again found himself toiling up the dirty staircase, and
on reaching the third landing was received by Agamemnon
in a roomy uniform of a chasseur—dark green and
tarnished gold, with a cocked-hat and black feather,
and a couteau de chasse, slung by a shining patent-leather
belt over his shoulder. The opening of the inner
door displayed the worthy Colonel sitting at his ease,
with his toes on each side of the stove (for the evenings
had begun to get cool), munching the last bit of crust
of the fifth Périgord pie that the Countess had got him
to buy.—He was extremely smart; thin black gauze-silk
stockings, black satin breeches; well-washed, well-starched
white waistcoat with a rolling collar, showing
an amplitude of frill, a blue coat with yellow buttons
and a velvet collar, while his pumps shone as bright
as polished steel.

The Countess presently sidled into the room, all
smirks and smiles as dressy ladies generally are when
well “got up.” Rouge and the milliner had effectually
reduced her age from five and forty down to five and
twenty. She wore a dress of the palest pink satin, with
lilies of the valley in her hair, and an exquisitely wrought
gold armlet, with a most Lilliputian watch in the centre.

Mr. Jorrocks having finished his pie-crust, and stuck
on his mustachios, the Countess blew out her bougies,
and the trio, preceeded by Agamemnon with a lanthorn
in his hand, descended the stairs, whose greasy, muddy
steps contrasted strangely with the rich delicacy of the
Countess’s beautifully slippered feet. Having handed
them into the voiture, Agamemnon mounted up behind,
and in less than ten minutes they rumbled into
the spacious courtyard of the Countess de Jackson, in
the Rue des Bons-Enfants, and drew up beneath a lofty
arch at the foot of a long flight of dirty black-and-white
marble stairs, about the centre of which was
stationed a lacquey de place to show the company up
to the hall. The Countess de Jackson (the wife of an
English horse-dealer) lived in an entresol au troisième,
but the hotel being of considerable dimensions, her
apartment was much more spacious than the Countess
Benvolio’s. Indeed, the Countess de Jackson, being a
marchande des modes, had occasion for greater accommodation,
and she had five low rooms, whereof the centre
one was circular, from which four others, consisting of
an ante-room, a kitchen, a bedroom, and salle à manger,
radiated.

Agamemnon having opened the door of the fiacre,
the Countess Benvolio took the Yorkshireman’s arm,
and at once preceded to make the ascent, leaving the
Colonel to settle the fare, observing as they mounted
the stairs, that he was “von exceeding excellent man,
but varé slow.”

“Madame la Contesse Benvolio and Monsieur Stoops!”
cried the lacquey de place as they reached the door of
the low ante-room, where the Countess Benvolio deposited
her shawl, and took a final look at herself in
the glass. She again took the Yorkshireman’s arm and
entered the round ballroom, which, though low and out
of all proportion, had an exceedingly gay appearance,
from the judicious arrangement of the numerous lights,
reflected in costly mirrors, and the simple elegance of
the crimson drapery, festooned with flowers and evergreens
against the gilded walls. Indeed, the hotel had
been the residence of an ambassador before the first
revolution, and this entresol had formed the private
apartment of his Excellency. The door immediately
opposite the one by which they entered, led into the
Countess de Jackson’s bedroom, which was also lighted
up, with the best furniture exposed and her toilette-table
set out with numberless scent bottles, vases,
trinkets, and nick-nacks, while the salle à manger was
converted into a card-room. Having been presented in
due form to the hostess, the Yorkshireman and his new
friend stood surveying the gay crowd of beautiful and
well-dressed women, large frilled and well-whiskered
men, all chatting, and bowing, and dancing, when a
half-suppressed titter that ran through the room
attracted their attention, and turning round, Mr.
Jorrocks was seen poking his way through the crowd
with a number of straws sticking to his feet, giving him
the appearance of a feathered Mercury. The fact was,
that Agamemnon had cleaned his shoes with the liquid
varnish (french polish), and forgetting to dry it properly,
the carrying away half the straw from the bottom
of the fiacre was the consequence, and Mr. Jorrocks
having paid the Jehu rather short, the latter had not
cared to tell him about it.

The straws were, however, soon removed without
interruption to the gaiety of the evening. Mr. Stubbs,
of course, took an early opportunity of waltzing with
the Countess Benvolio, who, as all French women are,
was an admirable dancer, and Jorrocks stood by fingering
and curling his mustachios, admiring her movements
but apparently rather jealous of the Yorkshireman. “I
wish,” said he after the dance was over, “that you
would sit down at écarté and let us try to win some of
these mouncheers’ tin, for I’m nearly cleaned out. Let
us go into the cardroom, but first let us see if we can
find anything in the way of nourishment, for I begin
to be hungry. Garsoon,” said he catching a servant
with a trayful of eau sucrée glasses, “avez-vous kick-shaws
to eat?” putting his finger in his mouth—”ge
wouderay some refreshment.” “Oh, oui,” replied the
garçon taking him to an open window overlooking the
courtyard, and extending his hand in the air, “voilà,
monsieur, de très bon rafraîchissement.”

The ball proceeded with the utmost decorum, for
though composed of shopkeepers and such like, there
was nothing in their dress or manner to indicate anything
but the best possible breeding. Jorrocks, indeed,
fancied himself in the very élite of French society,
and, but for a little incident, would have remained of
that opinion. In an unlucky moment he took it into
his head he could waltz, and surprised the Countess
Benvolio by claiming her hand for the next dance. “It
seems werry easy,” said he to himself as he eyed the
couples gliding round the room;—”at all ewents there’s
nothing like trying, ‘for he who never makes an effort
never risks a failure.'” The couples were soon formed
and ranged for a fresh dance. Jorrocks took a conspicuous
position in the centre of the room, buttoned
his coat, and, as the music struck up, put his arm round
the waist of his partner. The Countess, it seems, had
some misgivings as to his prowess in the dancing line,
and used all her strength to get him well off, but the
majority of the dancers started before him. At length,
however, he began to move, and went rolling away in
something between a gallop and a waltz, effecting two
turns, like a great cart-wheel, which brought him bang
across the room, right into the track of another couple,
who were swinging down at full speed, making a cannon
with his head against both theirs, and ending by all
four coming down upon the hard boards with a tremendous
crash—the Countess Benvolio undermost, then
the partner of the other Countess, then Jorrocks, and
then the other Countess herself. Great was the commotion,
and the music stopped; Jorrocks lost his wig,
and split his Beelzebub breeches across the knees,
while the other gentleman cracked his behind—and the
Countess Benvolio and the other Countess were considerably
damaged; particularly the other Countess,
who lost four false teeth and broke an ear-ring. This,
however, was not the worst, for as soon as they were all
scraped together and set right again, the other Countess’s
partner attacked Jorrocks most furiously, calling him a
sacré-nom de-Dieu’d bête of an Englishman, a mauvais
sujet, a cochon, etc., then spitting on the floor—the
greatest insult a Frenchman can offer—he vapoured
about being one of the “grand nation,” “that he was
brave—the world knew it,” and concluded by thrusting
his card—”Monsieur Charles Adolphe Eugene, Confiturier,
No. 15 bis, Rue Poupée”—into Jorrocks’s face.
It was now Jorrocks’s turn to speak, so doubling his
fists, and getting close to him, he held one to his nose,
exclaiming, “D—n ye, sir, je suis—JORROCKS!—Je suis
an Englishman! je vous lick within an inch of your life!
—Je vous kick!—je vous mill!—je vous flabbergaster!”
and concluded by giving him his card, “Monsieur le
Colonel Jorrocks, No 3, Rue des Mauvais-Garçons.”

A friend of the confectioner’s interposed and got him
away, and Mr. Stubbs persuaded Mr. Jorrocks to return
into the cardroom, where they were speedily waited
upon by the friend of the former, who announced that
the Colonel must make an apology or fight, for he said,
although Jorrocks was a “Colonel Anglais,” still Monsieur
Eugene was of the Legion of Honour, and, consequently,
very brave and not to be insulted with impunity.
All this the Yorkshireman interpreted to Mr.
Jorrocks, who was most anxious to fight, and wished it
was light that they might go to work immediately. Mr.
Stubbs therefore told the confectioner’s friend (who was
also his foreman), that the Colonel would fight him with
pistols at six o’clock in the Bois de Boulogne, but no
sooner was the word “pistols” mentioned than the
friend exclaimed, with a grimace and shrug of his
shoulders, “Oh horror, no! Monsieur Adolphe is brave,
but he will not touch pistols—they’re not weapons
of his country.” Jorrocks then proposed to fight him
with broad swords, but this the confectioner’s foreman
declined on behalf of his principal, and at last the
Colonel suggested that they could not do better than
fight it out with fists. Now, the confectioner was ten
years younger than Jorrocks, tall, long-armed, and not
over-burthened with flesh, and had, moreover, taken
lessons of Harry Harmer, when that worthy had his
school in Paris, so he thought the offer was a good one,
and immediately closed with it. Jorrocks, too, had been
a patron of the prize-ring, having studied under Bill
Richmond, the man of colour, and was reported to have
exhibited in early life (incog.) with a pugilist of some
pretensions at the Fives-court, so, all things considered,
fists seemed a very proper mode of settling the matter,
and that being agreed upon, each party quitted the
Countess de Jackson’s—the confectioner putting forth
all manner of high-flown ejaculations and prayers for
success, as he groped about the ante-room for his hat,
and descended the stairs. “Oh! God of war!” said he,
throwing up his hands, “who guided the victorious
army of this grand nation in Egypt, when, from the
pyramids, forty centuries beheld our actions—oh,
brilliant sun, who shone upon our armies at Jaffa,
at Naples, Montebello, Marengo, Austerlitz, Jena, and
Algiers, who blessed our endeavours, who knowest that
we are brave—brave as a hundred lions—look down on
Charles Adolphe Eugene, and enable him to massacre
and immolate on the altar of his wrath, this sacré-nom
de-Dieu’d beastly hog of an Englishman”—and thereupon
he spit upon the flags with all the venom of a
viper.

Jorrocks, too, indulged in a few figures of speech, as
he poked his way home, though of a different description.
“Now blister my kidneys,” said he, slapping his thigh,
“but I’ll sarve him out! I’ll baste him as Randall did
ugly Borrock. I’ll knock him about as Belcher did the
Big Ilkey Pigg. I’ll damage his mug as Turner did
Scroggins’s. I’ll fib him till he’s as black as Agamemnon—for
I do feel as though I could fight a few.”

The massive folding doors of the Porte-Cocher at the
Hôtel d’Hollande had not received their morning opening,
when a tremendous loud, long, protracted rat-tat-tat-tat-tan,
sounded like thunder throughout the extensive
square, and brought numerous nightcapped heads
to the windows, to see whether the hotel was on fire,
or another revolution had broken out. The maître d’hotel
screamed, the porter ran, the chef de cuisine looked out
of his pigeon-hole window, and the garçons and male
femmes des chambres rushed into the yard, with fear
and astonishment depicted on their countenances, when
on peeping through the grating of the little door, Mr.
Jorrocks was descried, knocker in hand, about to sound
a second edition. Now, nothing is more offensive to the
nerves of a Frenchman than a riotous knock, and the
impertinence was not at all migitated by its proceeding
from a stranger who appeared to have arrived through
the undignified medium of a co-cou.²³ Having scanned
his dimensions and satisfied himself that, notwithstanding
all the noise, Jorrocks was mere mortal man, the
porter unbolted the door, and commenced a loud and
energetic tirade of abuse against “Monsieur Anglais,”
for his audacious thumping, which he swore was enough
to make every man of the National Guard rush “to arms.”
In the midst of the torrent, very little of which Mr.
Jorrocks understood, the Yorkshireman appeared, whom
he hurried into the co-cou, bundled in after him, cried
“ally!” to the driver, and off they jolted at a miserably
slow trot. A little before seven they reached the village
of Passy, where it was arranged they should meet and
proceed from thence to the Bois de Boulogne, to select
a convenient place for the fight; but neither the confectioner
nor his second, nor any one on his behalf, was
visible and they walked the length and breadth of the
village, making every possible inquiry without seeing
or hearing anything of them. At length, having waited
a couple of hours, Mr. Jorrocks’s appetite overpowered
his desire of revenge, and caused him to retire to the
“Chapeau-Rouge” to indulge in a “fork breakfast.”
Nature being satisfied, he called for pen and ink, and
with the aid of Mr. Stubbs drew up the following proclamation
which to this day remains posted in the salle
à manger a copy whereof was transmitted by post to
the confectioner at Paris.

Footnote 23: (return) Co-cous are nondescript vehicles that ply in the environs of
Paris. They are a sort of cross between a cab and a young
Diligence.

PROCLAMATION!

I, John Jorrocks, of Great Coram Street, in the County
of Middlesex, Member of the Surrey Hunt, in England,
and Colonel of the Army when I’m in France, having
been grossly insulted by Charles Adolphe Eugene of
No. 15 bis, Rue Poupée, confectioner, this day repaired to
Passy, with the intention of sarving him out with my fists;
but, neither he nor any one for him having come to the
scratch, I, John Jorrocks, do hereby proclaim the said
Charles Adolphe Eugene to be a shabby fellow and no
soldier, and totally unworthy the notice of a fox-hunter
and a gentleman sportsman.

(Signed) JOHN JORROCKS.

(Countersigned) STUBBS.

This being completed, and the bill paid, they returned
leisurely on foot to Paris, looking first at one object,
then at another, so that the Countess Benvolio’s dinner-hour
was passed ere they reached the Tuileries Gardens,
where after resting themselves until it began to get
dusk, and their appetites returned, they repaired to
the Café de Paris to destroy them again.—The lofty
well-gilded salon was just lighted up, and the numberless
lamps reflected in costly mirrors in almost every partition
of the wall, aided by the graceful figures and elegant
dresses of the ladies, interspersed among the
sombre-coated gentry, with here and there the gay
uniforms of the military, imparted a fairy air to the scene,
which was not a little heightened by the contrast produced
by Mr. Jorrocks’s substantial figure, stumping through
the centre with his hat on his head, his hands behind his
back, and the dust of the day hanging about his Hessians.

“Garsoon,” said he, hanging up his hat, and taking
his place at a vacant table laid for two, “ge wouderai
some wittles,” and, accordingly, the spruce-jacketed,
white-aproned garçon brought him the usual red-backed
book with gilt edges, cut and lettered at the
side, like the index to a ledger, and, as Mr. Jorrocks
said, “containing reading enough for a month.” “Quelle
potage voulez vous, monsieur?” inquired the garçon at
last, tired of waiting while he studied the carte and
looked the words out in the dictionary. “Avez-vous any
potted lobster?” “Non,” said the garçon, “potage au
vermicelle, au riz, a la Julienne, consommé, et potage
aux choux.” “Old shoe! who the devil do you think
eats old shoes here? Have you any mock turtle or
gravy soup?” “Non, monsieur,” said the garçon with
a shrug of the shoulders. “Then avez-vous any roast
beef?” “Non, monsieur; nous avons boeuf au naturel—boeuf
à la sauce piquante—boeuf aux cornichons—boeuf
à la mode—boeuf aux choux—boeuf à la sauce
tomate—bifteck aux pommes de terre.” “Hold hard,”
said Jorrocks; “I’ve often heard that you can dress an
egg a thousand ways, and I want to hear no more
about it; bring me a beef-steak and pommes de terre
for three.” “Stop!” cried Mr. Stubbs, with dismay—”I
see you don’t understand ordering a dinner in France
—let me teach you. Where’s the carte?” “Here,” said
Mr. Jorrocks, “is ‘the bill of lading,'” handing over the
book.—”Garçon, apportez une douzaine des huîtres, un
citron, et du beurre frais,” said the Yorkshireman, and
while they were discussing the propriety of eating them
before or after the soup, a beautiful dish of little green
oysters made their appearance, which were encored before
the first supply was finished. “Now, Colonel,” said
the Yorkshireman, “take a bumper of Chablis,” lifting
a pint bottle out of the cooler. “It has had one plunge
in the ice-pail and no more—see what a delicate rind
it leaves on the glass!” eyeing it as he spoke. “Ay, but
I’d rayther it should leave something in the mouth than
on the side of the glass,” replied Mr. Jorrocks; “I loves
a good strong generous wine—military port, in fact—but
here comes fish and soup—wot are they?” “Filet
de sole au gratin, et potage au macaroni avec fromage
de Parmesan. I’ll take fish first, because the soup will
keep hot longest.” “So will I,” said Mr. Jorrocks, “for
I think you understand the thing—but they seem to
give werry small penn’orths—it really looks like trifling
with one’s appetite—I likes the old joint—the cut-and-come-again
system, such as we used to have at Sugden’s
in Cornhill—joint, wegitables, and cheese all for two
shillings.” “Don’t talk of your joints here,” rejoined
the Yorkshireman—”I told you before, you don’t understand
the art of eating—the dexterity of the thing
consists in titivating the appetite with delicate morsels
so as to prolong the pleasure. A well-regulated French
dinner lasts two hours, whereas you go off at score, and
take the shine out of yourself before you turn the
Tattenham Corner of your appetite. But come, take
another glass of Chablis, for your voice is husky as though
your throat was full of dust.—Will you eat some of
this boulli-vert?” “No, not no bouleward for me thank
ye.” “Well, then, we will have the ‘entrée de boeuf—beef
with sauce tomate—and there is a côtelette de veau
en papillotte;—which will you take?” “I’ll trouble the
beef, I think; I don’t like that ‘ere pantaloon cutlet much,
the skin is so tough.” “Oh, but you don’t eat the paper,
man; that is only put on to keep this nice layer of fat
ham from melting; take some, if it is only that you may
enjoy a glass of champagne after it. There is no meat
like veal for paving the way for a glass of champagne.”
“Well, I don’t care if I do, now you have explained how
to eat it, for I’ve really been troubled with indigestion
all day from eating one wholesale yesterday; but don’t
you stand potatoes—pommes de terre, as we say in
France?” “Oh yes, fried, and à la maître d’hotel; here
they come, smoking hot. Now, J—— for a glass of
champagne—take it out of the pail—nay, man! not
with both hands round the middle, unless you like it
warm—by the neck, so,” showing him how to do it
and pouring him a glass of still champagne. “This won’t
do,” said Jorrocks, holding it up to the candle; “garsoon!
garsoon!—no good—no bon—no fizzay, no fizzay,”
giving the bottom of the bottle a slap with his hand to
rouse it. “Oh, but this is still champagne,” explained
the Yorkshireman, “and far the best.” “I don’t think
so,” retorted Mr. Jorrocks, emptying the glass into his
water-stand. “Well, then, have a bottle of the other,”
rejoined the Yorkshireman, ordering one. “And who’s
to pay for it?” inquired Mr. Jorrocks. “Oh, never mind
that—care killed the cat—give a loose to pleasure for
once, for it’s a poor heart that never rejoices. Here it
comes, and ‘may you never know what it is to want,’
as the beggar boys say.—Now, let’s see you treat it
like a philosopher—the wire is off, so you’ve nothing
to do but cut the string, and press the cork on one side
with your thumb.—Nay! you’ve cut both sides!” Fizz,
pop, bang, and away went the cork close past the
ear of an old deaf general, and bounded against the
wall.—”Come, there’s no mischief done, so pour out
the wine.—Your good health, old boy, may you live
for a thousand years, and I be there to count them!
—Now, that’s what I call good,” observed the Yorkshireman,
holding up his glass, “see how it dulls the
glass, even to the rim—champagne isn’t worth a copper
unless it’s iced—is it, Colonel?” “Vy, I don’t know—carn’t
say I like it so werry cold; it makes my teeth
chatter, and cools my courage as it gets below—champagne
certainly gives one werry gentlemanly ideas, but
for a continuance, I don’t know but I should prefer
mild hale.” “You’re right, old boy, it does give one very
gentlemanly ideas, so take another glass, and you’ll
fancy yourself an emperor.—Your good health again.”
“The same to you, sir. And now wot do you call this
chap?” “That is a quail, the other a snipe—which will
you take?” “Vy, a bit of both, I think; and do you
eat these chaps with them?” “Yes, nothing nicer—artichokes
á la sauce blanche; you get the real eating
part, you see, by having them sent up this way, instead
of like haystacks, as they come in England, diving and
burning your fingers amid an infinity of leaves.” “They
are werry pretty eating, I must confess; and this upper
Binjamin of ham the birds are cooked in is delicious. I’ll
trouble you for another plateful.” “That’s right, Colonel,
you are yourself again. I always thought you would come
back into the right course; and now you are good for a
glass of claret of light Hermitage. Come, buck up, and
give a loose to pleasure for once.” “For once, ay, that’s
what you always say; but your once comes so werry
often.” “Say no more.—Garçon! un demi-bouteille de
St. Julien; and here, J——, is a dish upon which I will
stake my credit as an experienced caterer—a Charlotte
de pommes—upon my reputation it is a fine one, the
crust is browned to a turn, and the rich apricot sweet-meat
lies ensconced in the middle, like a sleeping babe
in its cradle. If ever man deserved a peerage and a
pension it is this cook.” “It’s werry delicious—order
another.” “Oh, your eyes are bigger than your stomach,
Mr. J——. According to all mathematical calculations,
this will more than suffice. Ay, I thought so—you are
regularly at a stand-still. Take a glass of whatever you
like. Good—I’ll drink Chablis to your champagne. And
now, that there may be no mistake as to our country,
we will have some cheese—fromage de Roquefort,
Gruyère, Neufchatel, or whatever you like—and a
beaker of Burgundy after, and then remove the cloth,
for I hate dabbling in dowlas after dinner is done.”
“Rum beggars these French,” said Mr. Jorrocks to
himself, laying down the newspaper, and taking a sip
of Churchman’s chocolate, as on the Sunday morning
he sat with the Countess Benvolio, discussing rolls and
butter, with Galignani’s Messenger, for breakfast.

“Rum beggars, indeed,” said he, resuming the paper,
and reading the programme of the amusements for the
day, commencing with the hour of Protestant service
at the Ambassador’s Chapel, followed on by Palace and
Gallery of Pictures of the Palais Royal—Review with
Military Music in the Place du Carousel—Horse-races
in the Champs de Mars—Fête in the Park of
St. Cloud—Combat d’Animaux, that is to say, dog-fighting and
bull-baiting, at the Barrière du Combat, Tivoli, etc., etc.,
“It’s not werry right, but I suppose at Rome we must
do as Romans do,” with which comfortable reflection
Mr. Jorrocks proposed that the Countess and he should
go to the races. Madame was not partial to animals of
any description, but having got a new hat and feathers
she consented to show them, on condition that they
adjoined to the fête at St. Cloud in the evening.

Accordingly, about noon, the ostler’s man of a neighbouring
English livery-stable drew up a dark-coloured
job cab, with a red-and-white striped calico lining,
drawn by a venerable long-backed white horse, at the
Countess’s gateway in the Rue des Mauvais-Garçons,
into which Mr. Jorrocks having handed her ladyship,
and Agamemnon, who was attired in his chasseur
uniform, having climbed up behind, the old horse,
after two or three flourishes of his dirty white tail,
as a sort of acknowledgment of the whip on his sides,
got himself into motion, and proceeded on his way to
the races. The Countess being resolved to cut a dash,
had persuaded our hero to add a smart second-hand
cocked-hat, with a flowing red-and-white feather, to the
rest of his military attire; and the end of a scarlet handkerchief,
peeping out at the breast of his embroidered
frock-coat, gave him the appearance of wearing a decoration,
and procured him the usual salute from the soldiers
and veterans of the Hospital of Invalids, who were
lounging about the ramparts and walks of the edifice.
The Countess’s costume was simple and elegant; a sky-blue
satin pelisse with boots to match, and a white
satin bonnet with white feathers, tipped with blue, and
delicate primrose-coloured gloves. Of course the head
of the cab was well thrown back to exhibit the elegant
inmates to the world.

Great respect is paid to the military in France, as
Mr. Jorrocks found by all the hack, cab, and fiacre
drivers pulling up and making way for him to pass,
as the old crocodile-backed white horse slowly dragged
its long length to the gateway of the Champ de Mars.
Here the guard, both horse and foot, saluted him,
which he politely acknowledged, under direction of the
Countess, by raising his chapeau bras, and a subaltern
was dispatched by the officer in command to conduct
him to the place appointed for the carriages to stand. But
for this piece of attention Mr. Jorrocks would certainly
have drawn up at the splendid building of the École
Militaire, standing as it does like a grand stand in the
centre of the gravelly dusty plain of the Champ de Mars.
The officer, having speared his way through the crowd
with the usual courtesy of a Frenchman, at length drew
up the cab in a long line of anonymous vehicles under
the rows of stunted elms by the stone-lined ditch, on
the southern side of the plain when, turning his charger
round, he saluted Mr. Jorrocks, and bumped off at a
trot. Mr. Jorrocks then stuck the pig-driving whip into
the socket, and throwing forward the apron, handed
out the Countess, and installed Agamemnon in the cab.

A fine day and a crowd make the French people
thoroughly happy, and on this afternoon the sun shone
brightly and warmly on the land;—still there was no
apparently settled purpose for the assembling of the
multitude, who formed themselves in groups upon the
plain, or lined the grass-burnt mounds at the sides, in
most independent parties. The Champ de Mars forms
a regular parallelogram of 2700 feet by 1320, and the
course, which is of an oblong form, comprises a circuit
of the whole, and is marked out with strong posts and
ropes. Within the course, equestrians—or more properly
speaking, “men on horseback”—are admitted under the
surveillance of a regiment of cavalry, while infantry
and cavalry are placed in all directions with drawn
swords and fixed bayonets to preserve order. Being a
gravelly sandy soil, in almost daily requisition for the
exercise and training of troops, no symptoms of vegetation
can be expected, and the course is as hard as the
ride in Rotten Row or up to Kensington Gardens.

About the centre of the south side, near where the
carriages were drawn up, a few temporary stands were
erected for the royal family and visitors, the stand for
the former being in the centre, and hung with scarlet
and gold cloth, while the others were tastefully arranged
with tri-coloured drapery. These are entered by tickets
only, but there are always plenty of platforms formed
by tables and “chaises à louer” (chairs to let) for those
who don’t mind risking their necks for a sight. Some few
itinerants tramped about the plain, offering alternately
tooth-picks, play-bills, and race-lists for sale. Mr. Jorrocks,
of course, purchased one of the latter, which was decorated
at the top with a woodcut, representing three
jockeys riding two horses, one with a whip as big as a
broad sword. We append the list as a
specimen of “Sporting in France,” which, we are sorry to
see, does not run into our pages quite so cleverly as our
printer could wish.²⁴

Footnote 24: (return) Racing in France is, of course, now a very different business
to the primitive sport it was when this sketch was written.—EDITOR.

Foreigners accuse the English of claiming every good-looking
horse, and every well-built carriage, met on the
Continent, as their own, but we think that few would
be ambitious of laying claim to the honour of supplying
France with jockeys or racehorses. Mr. Jorrocks, indeed,
indifferent as he is to the affairs of the turf, could not
suppress his “conwiction” of the difference between
the flibberty-gibberty appearance of the Frenchmen,
and the quiet, easy, close-sitting jockeys of Newmarket.
The former all legs and elbows, spurting and pushing
to the front at starting, in tawdry, faded jackets, and
nankeen shorts, just like the frowsy door-keepers of an
Epsom gambling-booth; the latter in clean, neat-fitting
leathers, well-cleaned boots, spick and span new jackets,
feeling their horses’ mouths, quietly in the rear, with
their whip hands resting on their thighs. Then such
riding! A hulking Norman with his knees up to his
chin, and a long lean half-starved looking Frenchman sat
astride like a pair of tongs, with a wet sponge applied to
his knees before starting, followed by a runaway English
stable lad, in white cords and drab gaiters, and half a
dozen others equally singular, spurring and tearing
round and round, throwing the gravel and sand into
each other’s faces, until the field was so separated as
to render it difficult to say which was leading and which
was tailing, for it is one of the rules of their races, that
each heat must be run in a certain time, consequently,
though all the horses may be distanced, the winner keeps
working away. Then what an absence of interest and
enthusiasm on the part of the spectators! Three-fourths
of them did not know where the horses started, scarcely
a man knew their names, and the few tenpenny bets
that were made, were sported upon the colour of the
jackets. A Frenchman has no notion of racing, and it
is on record that after a heat in which the winning horse,
after making a waiting race, ran in at the finish, a Parisian
observed, that “although ‘Annette’ had won at
the finish, he thought the greater honour was due to
‘Hercule,’ he having kept the lead the greater part of
the distance.” On someone explaining to him that the
jockey on Annette had purposely made a waiting race, he
was totally incredulous, asserting that he was sure the
jockeys had too much amour-propre to remain in the
rear at any part of the race, when they might be in front.

X. SPORTING IN FRANCE

(View full size)

“Moderate sport,” said Mr. Jorrocks to himself, curling
his mustachios and jingling a handful of five-franc
pieces in the pocket of his leathers—”moderate sport
indeed,” and therefore he turned his back to the course
and walked the Countess off towards the cab.

From beneath a low tenth-rate-looking booth, called
“The Cottage of Content,” supported by poles placed
on the stunted trees of the avenue, and exhibiting on
a blue board, “John Jones, dealer in British beer,” in
gilt letters, there issued the sound of voices clamouring
about odds, and weights and scales, and on looking in,
a score of ragamuffin-looking grooms, imitation jockeys,
and the usual hangers-on of the racehorses and livery-stables,
were seen drinking beer, smoking, playing at
cards, dice, and chuck-farthing. Before the well-patched
canvas curtain that flapped before the entrance, a crowd
had collected round one of the horses which was in the
care of five or six fellows, one to hold him, another to
whistle to him, a third to whisk the flies away with a
horse’s tail, a fourth to scrape him, a fifth to rinse his
mouth out,—while the stud-groom, a tall, gaunt, hairy-looking
fellow, in his shirt sleeves, with ear-rings, a blue
apron and trousers (more like a gardener than a groom),
walked round and round with mystified dignity, sacréing
and muttering, “Ne parlez pas, ne parlez pas,” as
anyone approached who seemed likely to ask questions.
Mr. Jorrocks, having well ascertained the importance
of his hat and feather, pushed his way with the greatest
coolness into the ring, just to cast his eye over the horse
and see whether he was fit to go with the Surrey, and
the stud-groom immediately took off his lavender-coloured
foraging cap, and made two profound salaams,
one to the Colonel, the other to the Countess. Mr.
Jorrocks, all politeness, took off his chapeau, and no
sooner was it in the air, than with a wild exclamation
of surprise and delight, the groom screamed, “Oh, Monsieur
Shorrock, mon ami, comment vous portez vous?”
threw his arms round the Colonel’s neck, and kissed
him on each cheek.

“Hold!” roared the Colonel, half smothered in the
embrace, and disengaging himself he drew back a few
paces, putting his hand on the hilt of his sword, when
in the training groom of Paris he recognised his friend
the Baron of Newmarket. The abruptness of the incident
disarmed Mr. Jorrocks of reflection, and being a man
of impulse and warm affections, he at once forgave the
novelty of the embrace, and most cordially joined hands
with those of his friend. They then struck up a mixture
of broken English and equally broken French, in mutual
inquiries after each other’s healths and movements, and
presuming that Mr. Jorrocks was following up the sporting
trade in Paris, the Baron most considerately gave
him his best recommendations which horse to back,
kindly betting with him himself, but, unfortunately,
at each time assigning Mr. Jorrocks the losing horse.
At length, being completely cleaned out, he declined
any further transactions, and having got the Countess
into the cab, was in the act of climbing in himself, when
someone took him by the sword as he was hoisting
himself up by the wooden apron, and drew him back
to the ground. “Holloa, Stubbs, my boy!” cried he,
“I’m werry ‘appy to see ye,” holding out his hand,
and thereupon Mr. Stubbs took off his hat to the
Countess. “Well now, the deuce be in these French,”
observed Mr. Jorrocks, confidentially, in an undertone
as, resigning the reins to Agamemnon, he put his arm
through the Yorkshireman’s and drew out of hearing
of the Countess behind the cab—”the deuce be in them.
I say. There’s that beggarly Baron as we met at Newmarket
has just diddled me out of four Naps and a
half, by getting me to back ‘osses that he said were
certain to win, and I really don’t know how we are to
make ‘tongue and buckle’ meet, as the coachmen say.
Somehow or other they are far too sharp for me.
Cards, dominoes, dice, backgammon, and racing, all
one—they inwariably beat me, and I declare I haven’t
as much pewter as will coach me to Calais.” The Yorkshireman,
as may be supposed, was not in a condition
of any great pecuniary assistance, but after a turn
or two along the mound, he felt it would be a reproach
on his country if he suffered his friend to be done by
a Frenchman, and on consideration he thought of a
trick that Monsieur would not be up to. Accordingly,
desiring Mr. Jorrocks to take him to the Baron, and
behave with great cordiality, and agree to the proposal
he should make, they set off in search of that worthy,
who, after some trouble, they discovered in the “Cottage
of Content,” entertaining John Jones and his comrades
with an account of the manner in which he had fleeced
Monsieur Shorrock. The Yorkshireman met him with
the greatest delight, shook hands with him over and
over again, and then began talking about racing, pigeon-shooting,
and Newmarket, pretended to be full of
money, and very anxious for the Baron’s advice in
laying it out. On hearing this, the Baron beckoned him
to retire, and joining him in the avenue, walked him
up and down, while he recommended his backing a
horse that was notoriously amiss. The Yorkshireman
consented, lost a Nap with great good humour, and
banteringly told the Baron he thought he could beat
the horse on foot. This led them to talk of foot-racing
and at last the Yorkshireman offered to bet that Mr.
Jorrocks would run fifty yards with him on his back,
before the Baron would run a hundred. Upon this the
Baron scratched his head and looked very knowing,
pretended to make a calculation, when the Yorkshireman
affected fear, and professed his readiness to withdraw
the offer. The Baron then plucked up his courage,
and after some haggling, the match was made for six
Naps, the Yorkshireman reckoning the Baron might
have ten francs in addition to what he had won of Mr.
Jorrocks and himself. The money was then deposited
in the hands of the Countess Benvolio, and away went
the trio to the “Cottage of Content,” to get men and
ropes to measure and keep the ground. The English
jockeys and lads, though ready enough to pigeon a
countryman themselves, have no notion of assisting a
foreigner to do so, unless they share in the spoil, and
the Baron being a notorious screw, they all seemed
heartily glad to find him in a trap. Out then they all
sallied, amid cheers and shouts, while John Jones, with
a yard-wand in his hand, proceeded to measure a hundred
yards along the low side of the mound. This
species of amusement being far more in accordance
with the taste of the French than anything in which
horses are concerned, an immense mob flocked to the
scene, and the Baron having explained how it was,
and being considered a safe man to follow, numerous
offers were made to bet against the performance of the
match. The Yorkshireman being a youth of discretion
and accustomed to bet among strangers, got on five
Naps more with different parties, who to “prevent
accidents” submitted to deposit the money with the
Countess, and all things being adjusted, and the course
cleared by a picket of infantry, Mr. Jorrocks ungirded
his sword, and depositing it with his frock-coat in the
cab, walked up to the fifty yards he was to have for start.
“Now, Colonel,” said the Yorkshireman, backing him
to the mound, so that he might leap on without shaking
him, “put your best leg first, and it’s a hollow thing;
if you don’t fall, you must win,”—and thereupon taking
Mr. Jorrocks’s cocked hat and feather from his head,
he put it sideways on his own, so that he might not be
recognised, and mounted his man. Mr. Jorrocks then
took his place as directed by John Jones, and at a signal
from him—the dropping of a blue cotton handkerchief—away
they started amid the shouts, the clapping
of hands, and applause of the spectators, who covered
the mound and lined the course on either side. Mr.
Jorrocks’s action was not very capital, his jack-boots
and leathers rather impeding his limbs, while the Baron
had as little on him as decency would allow. The Yorkshireman
feeling his man rather roll at the start, again
cautioned him to take it easy, and after a dozen yards
he got into a capital run, and though the lanky Baron
came tearing along like an ill-fed greyhound, Mr. Jorrocks
had full two yards to spare, and ran past the soldier, who
stood with his cap on his bayonet as a winning-post,
amid the applause of his backers, the yells of his
opponents, and the general acclamation of the spectators.

The Countess, anticipating the victory of her hero,
had dispatched Agamemnon early in the day for a
chaplet of red-and-yellow immortelles, and having
switched the old cab horse up to the winning-post,
she gracefully descended, without showing more of her
foot and ankle than was strictly correct, and decorated
his brow with the wreath, as the Yorkshireman dismounted.
Enthusiasm being always the order of the
day in France, this act was greeted with the loudest
acclamations, and, without giving him time to recover
his wind, the populace bundled Mr. Jorrocks neck and
shoulders into the cab, and seizing the old horse by the
head, paraded him down the entire length of the Champ
de Mars, Mr. Jorrocks bowing and kissing his hands to
the assembled multitude, in return for the vivas! the
clapping of hands, and the waving of ribbons and handkerchiefs
that greeted him as he went.

Popularity is but a fickle goddess, and in no country
more fickle than in France. Ere the procession reached
the end of the dusty plain, the mob had tailed off very
considerably, and as the leader of the old white horse
pulled him round to return, a fresh commotion in the
distance, caused by the apprehension of a couple of
pickpockets, drew away the few followers that remained,
and the recently applauded and belauded Mr. Jorrocks
was left alone in his glory. He then pulled up, and taking
the chaplet of immortelles from his brow, thrust it
under the driving cushion of the cab, and proceeded
to reinstate himself in his tight military frock, re-gird
himself with his sword, and resume the cocked hat and
feather.

Nothing was too good for Mr. Stubbs at that moment,
and, had a pen and ink been ready, Mr. Jorrocks would
have endorsed him a bill for any amount. Having completed
his toilette he gave the Yorkshireman the vacant
seat in the cab, flopped the old horse well about the
ears with the pig-driving whip, and trotted briskly up
the line he had recently passed in triumphal procession,
and wormed his way among the crowd in search of the
Countess. There was nothing, however, to be seen of
her, and after driving about, and poking his way on
foot into all the crowds he could find, bolting up to
every lady in blue, he looked at his great double-cased
gold repeater, and finding it was near three o’clock and
recollecting the fête of St. Cloud, concluded her ladyship
must have gone on, and Agamemnon being anxious
to see it, of course was of the same opinion; so, again
flopping the old horse about the ears, he cut away
down the Champ de Mars, and by the direction of
Agamemnon crossed the Seine by the Pont des Invalides,
and gained the route to Versailles.