Bentley's Miscellany, Volume II

At another time, – nay, a few hours before their visit, – the Grits would not have been received; now, in the distressed state of the family, they were welcomed with cordiality.

But the mind sickens at the object of their visit, – to advise Mr. Cannon to accede to his lordship's proposals, and not irritate a powerful enemy by an idle show of independence!! – But to think of a reconciliation brought about by a butcher's daughter and a butler! – No, no, thrice no; – the breach was immeasurably widened. Mr. Cannon stuttered and stammered all the insults that had been heaped upon him. Mrs. Grits plainly saw that no pacification could be expected; and, although she expressed the utmost regret, she was inwardly delighted, as it did not exactly suit her views that she should be known to be a butcher's daughter. She, therefore, seizing both Mrs. Cannon's trembling hands in the kindest manner, attempted to console and advise her.

"I can readily imagine, my dear friend, how much this overbearing conduct of my lord should have annoyed you. Oh! he is as proud as Lucifer when he goes to open his parliament! It is such men, my dear, that make me abhor this horrible England."

"Ay, horrible England!" repeated Mr. Cannon with ferocity.

"I have lived too long in that dear delicious France, that belle France, to exist, or rather vegetate, in this abominable country."

This word, "France," acted like a magic spell; it seemed a password, a Shibboleth, an open sesame to regions of delight.

"Ay, France is the country! only ask Mr. Grits."

"Oh, there's nothing like it!" responded Mr. Grits, a jolly red-faced fellow, with an enormous abdomen, rendered more salient by a flapped white waistcoat.

"And such society, oh! such an opening for young people, oh! No one asks who and what you are, only have the caraways! Lord bless me! there was Mrs. Triplet, the pawnbroker of Islington's wife, married her daughter Peg to a French count; and Mr. Rumstuff, the tailor in the Minories, married his daughter to a general, – ay, a real general; and then, such living, and such society, and such amusements! Gardes du corps with such nice moustaches, and pâtés de truffes, and omelettes soufflées, and bals champêtres at Tivoli, and glasses at Tortoni's, and poulets à la crapaudine, and salmis de lièvre, and then, the masked-balls at the opera, oh! and des œufs à la neige, and des œufs au miroir! How many ways have the French of cooking eggs, Mr. G.?"

"Three hundred and forty-three, Mrs. G."

"Only think of that! I make Mr. G. live upon eggs à la coque, à la tripe. And then meat at fourpence per pound!"

"Fivepence halfpenny for prime joints, if you please, Mrs. G." added Mr. G.

"And such poultry! such capons! You have no capons in England, my dear. Bless us, they don't know what's what! and so many delicious ways of cooking them, chapon à la barbare, chapon à la Veluti, chapon au parfait amour; and then, the Hussars, and the Lancers, and the horse and foot dragoons. Oh! women there may do whatever they like! and girls may string lovers like a brochette of ortolans!"

In short, Mrs. Grits gave such a flattering account of France, its pleasures, its cookery, and its economy, that it was decided that to France the family should go. Mr. Cannon said he was too old to learn to parlez-vous, but the ladies procured grammars and dictionaries, to brush up their boarding-school education; and in ten days the whole family were packed up in three travelling carriages, and set out for Dover; their only domestics, Sam Surly, a Yorkshire coachman, and Sukey Simper, a Kentish maid, whom we shall again find on the road.

Such is the ingratitude of mankind that all Muckford was delighted with their departure. "Hurrah! All the Cannons are gone off!" exclaimed Mr. Sniffnettle.

Lady Tabby Catson died soon after, leaving a handsome legacy to Mr. Hiccup, the surgeon. Muzzle got a living, and resided at Wick-Hall, the name of which he changed into Cushion-Lodge, alluding, no doubt, to the otium he enjoyed. Sniffnettle was made under-steward of Lord Wittington's estate; and Mr. Grits opened an inn at the sign of the Mitre, opposite Cushion-Lodge, and, as the Rev. Mr. Muzzle had been appointed tutor to the youngest of the honourable Catsons, whenever he saw the sign bearing the episcopal diadem swinging in the wind, despite all humility, a warrantable ambition would often lead him to an association of ideas in which a crosier acted as a favourite crotchet; nay, in his sleep sometimes Queen Mab would tickle his nose until he dreamt of bishopricks, congés d'élire, and visitation dinners, and then he would suddenly awake and terrify Mrs. Muzzle, roaring out "Nolo Episcopari!"

A CHAPTER ON LAUGHING

"And Laughter holding both his sides." – Milton

If you were to ask a learned physician to explain to you the peculiar sensation termed laughter, it is more than likely he would astonish you with an amazing profundity of erudition, ending in the sage conclusion that he knows nothing more about the matter than that it is a very natural emotion of the senses, generally originating with a good joke, and not unfrequently terminating in a fit of indigestion. If he happened to be (as there are many) a priggish quack, it is not unlikely he would add as a sequel, that it was a most injurious and unmannerly indulgence, particularly favouring a determination of blood to the head, and decidedly calculated to injure the fine nerves of the facial organ! If, on the contrary, he should be a good, honest follower of Galen, he would not fail to pronounce it the most fearful enemy to his profession, as being altogether incompatible with physic and the blues, and, by way of illustration, he might go so far as to read a chapter of Tom Hood's best, in order to prove the strength of his position.

Laughter – good, hearty, cheerful-hearted laughter – is the echo of a happy spirit, the attribute of a cloudless mind. Life without it were without hope, for it is the exuberance of hope. It is an emotion possessed by man alone, – the happy light that relieves the dark picture of life.

We laugh most, when we are young; the thoughts are then free and unfettered, there is nothing to bind their fierce impulse, and we sport with the passions with the bold daring of ignorance. Smiles and tears, it has been observed, follow each other like gloom and sunshine; so the childish note of mirth treads on the heels of sorrow. It was but yesterday we noticed a little urchin writhing apparently in the agony of anguish; he had been punished for some trivial delinquency, and his little spirit resented it most gloriously. How the young dog roared! His little chest heaved up and down; and every blue vein on his pure forehead was apparent, – bursting with passion. Anon, a conciliatory word was addressed to him by the offended gouvernante; a smile passed over the boy's face; his little eyes, sparkling through a cloud of tears, were thrown upwards; a short struggle between pride and some other powerful feeling ensued; and then there burst forth such a peal of laughter, so clear, so full, so round, it would have touched the heart of a stoic!

Our natural passions and emotions become subdued, or altogether changed, as we enter the world. The laugh of the schoolboy is checked by the frown of the master. He is acquiring wisdom, and wisdom (ye Gods, how dearly bought!) is incompatible with laughter. But still, at times, when loosened from his shackles, the pining student will burst forth as in days gone by: but he has no longer the cue and action for passion he then had; the cares of the world have already mingled themselves in his cup, and his young spirit is drooping beneath their influence. The laughter of boyhood is a merry carol; but the first rich blush has already passed away. The boy enters the world, full of the gay buoyancy of youth. He looks upon those he meets as the playmates of other hours. But Experience teaches him her lessons; the natural feelings of his heart are checked; he may laugh and talk as formerly, but the spell, the dreams that cast such a halo round his young days, are dissipated and broken.

There are fifty different classes of laughers. There is your smooth-faced politic laugher, your laugher by rule. These beings are generally found within the precincts of a court, at the heels of some great man, to whose conduct they shape their passions as a model. Does his lordship say a bon mot, it is caught up and grinned at in every possible manner till, the powers of grimace expended, his lordship is pleased to change the subject, and strike a different chord. And it is not astonishing. Who would refuse to laugh for a pension of two hundred a year? Common gratitude demands it.

There is, then, your habitual laugher, men who laugh by habit, without rhyme or reason. They are generally stout, piggy-faced gentlemen, who eat hearty suppers, and patronise free-and-easys. They will meet you with a grin on their countenance, which, before you have said three sentences, will resolve itself into a simper, and terminate finally in a stentorian laugh. These men may truly be said to go through life laughing; but habit has blunted the finer edges of their sympathies, and their mirth is but the unmeaning effusion of a weak spirit. These personages generally go off in fits of apoplexy, brought on by excessive laughter on a full stomach!

There is, then, your discontented cynical laugher, who makes a mask of mirth to conceal the venom of his mind. It is a dead fraud that ought not to be pardoned. Speak to one of these men of happiness, virtue, &c. he meets you with a sneer, or a bottle-imp kind of chuckle; talk to him of any felicitous circumstance, he checks you with a sardonic grin, that freezes your best intentions. He is a type of the death's head the Egyptians placed at their feasts to check exuberant gaiety.

There is, then, your fashionable simperer, your laugher à-la-mode, your inward digester of small jokes and tittle-tattle. He never laughs, – it is a vulgar habit; the only wonder is, that he eats. People, he will tell you, should overcome these vulgar propensities; they are abominable. A young man of this class is generally consumptive, his lungs have no play, he is always weak and narrow-chested; he vegetates till fifty, and then goes off, overcome with a puff of eau de rose, or millefleur, he has encountered accidentally from the pocket-handkerchief of a cheesemonger's wife!

Last of all, there is your real, good, honest laugher; the man who has a heart to feel and sympathize with the joys and sorrows of others; who has gone through life superior to its follies, and has learnt to gather wisdom even from laughter. Such are the men who do honour to society, who have learnt to be temperate in prosperity, patient in adversity; and, who, having gathered experience from years, are content to drink the cup of life mingled as it is, to enjoy calmly the sweeter portion, and laugh at the bitter.

There is a strange affinity in our passions. The heart will frequently reply to the saddest intelligence by a burst of the most unruly laughter, the effigy of mirth. It seems as though the passion, like a rude torrent, were too strong to pursue its ordinary course; but, breaking forth from the narrow channel that confined it, rushed forth in one broad impetuous stream. It is the voice of anguish that has chosen a different garb, and would cheat the sympathies. But we have ourselves been demonstrating the truth of our last proposition; for we have been writing on laughter till we have grown sad. But what says the old song?

"To-night we'll merry, merry be,
To-morrow we'll be sober."

So sadness, after all, is but joy deferred.

A MUSTER CHAUNT

FOR THE MEMBERS OF THE TEMPERANCE SOCIETIES

Wine! wine! fill up
The sparkling cup
With champagne hissing to the brim;
For wit, and joy, and rapture, swim
In bumpers. The grape's blood is mine;
I'll steep my heart in it till it shine
With the warm flush
The purple blush
Of wine!

Wine! wine! the frown
Of Care we'll drown
In deep libations to the God
Who planted first on Nysa's sod
The branches of the illustrious vine.
Bacchus, we worship at thy shrine!
In Pleasure's bowers
Swift fly the Hours
Whose wings are wash'd with wine!

Wine! wine! the brow
Is mantling now;
The eye is flashing with "the flow
Of soul," the cheek has caught its glow;
The lips are breathing words divine,
While wreaths of song around them twine
In glorious lays,
Chaunting the praise
Of racy wine!

Wine! wine! fill up
And quaff the cup
To lovely woman! Drink again
To all bold festive souls who drain
The crystal bowl, and wear the sign