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_ It came into my mind that I would recall in these notes a few of
the many hostelries I have rested at in the course of my journeys;
and, indeed, I had taken up my pen for the purpose, when I was
baffled by an accidental circumstance. It was the having to leave
off, to wish the owner of a certain bright face that looked in at
my door, 'many happy returns of the day.' Thereupon a new thought
came into my mind, driving its predecessor out, and I began to
recall--instead of Inns--the birthdays that I have put up at, on my
way to this present sheet of paper.
I can very well remember being taken out to visit some peach-faced
creature in a blue sash, and shoes to correspond, whose life I
supposed to consist entirely of birthdays. Upon seed-cake, sweet
wine, and shining presents, that glorified young person seemed to
me to be exclusively reared. At so early a stage of my travels did
I assist at the anniversary of her nativity (and become enamoured
of her), that I had not yet acquired the recondite knowledge that a
birthday is the common property of all who are born, but supposed
it to be a special gift bestowed by the favouring Heavens on that
one distinguished infant. There was no other company, and we sat
in a shady bower--under a table, as my better (or worse) knowledge
leads me to believe--and were regaled with saccharine substances
and liquids, until it was time to part. A bitter powder was
administered to me next morning, and I was wretched. On the whole,
a pretty accurate foreshadowing of my more mature experiences in
such wise!
Then came the time when, inseparable from one's own birthday, was a
certain sense of merit, a consciousness of well-earned distinction.
When I regarded my birthday as a graceful achievement of my own, a
monument of my perseverance, independence, and good sense,
redounding greatly to my honour. This was at about the period when
Olympia Squires became involved in the anniversary. Olympia was
most beautiful (of course), and I loved her to that degree, that I
used to be obliged to get out of my little bed in the night,
expressly to exclaim to Solitude, 'O, Olympia Squires!' Visions of
Olympia, clothed entirely in sage-green, from which I infer a
defectively educated taste on the part of her respected parents,
who were necessarily unacquainted with the South Kensington Museum,
still arise before me. Truth is sacred, and the visions are
crowned by a shining white beaver bonnet, impossibly suggestive of
a little feminine postboy. My memory presents a birthday when
Olympia and I were taken by an unfeeling relative--some cruel
uncle, or the like--to a slow torture called an Orrery. The
terrible instrument was set up at the local Theatre, and I had
expressed a profane wish in the morning that it was a Play: for
which a serious aunt had probed my conscience deep, and my pocket
deeper, by reclaiming a bestowed half-crown. It was a venerable
and a shabby Orrery, at least one thousand stars and twenty-five
comets behind the age. Nevertheless, it was awful. When the low-
spirited gentleman with a wand said, 'Ladies and gentlemen'
(meaning particularly Olympia and me), 'the lights are about to be
put out, but there is not the slightest cause for alarm,' it was
very alarming. Then the planets and stars began. Sometimes they
wouldn't come on, sometimes they wouldn't go off, sometimes they
had holes in them, and mostly they didn't seem to be good
likenesses. All this time the gentleman with the wand was going on
in the dark (tapping away at the heavenly bodies between whiles,
like a wearisome woodpecker), about a sphere revolving on its own
axis eight hundred and ninety-seven thousand millions of times--or
miles--in two hundred and sixty-three thousand five hundred and
twenty-four millions of something elses, until I thought if this
was a birthday it were better never to have been born. Olympia,
also, became much depressed, and we both slumbered and woke cross,
and still the gentleman was going on in the dark--whether up in the
stars, or down on the stage, it would have been hard to make out,
if it had been worth trying--cyphering away about planes of orbits,
to such an infamous extent that Olympia, stung to madness, actually
kicked me. A pretty birthday spectacle, when the lights were
turned up again, and all the schools in the town (including the
National, who had come in for nothing, and serve them right, for
they were always throwing stones) were discovered with exhausted
countenances, screwing their knuckles into their eyes, or clutching
their heads of hair. A pretty birthday speech when Dr. Sleek of
the City-Free bobbed up his powdered head in the stage-box, and
said that before this assembly dispersed he really must beg to
express his entire approval of a lecture as improving, as
informing, as devoid of anything that could call a blush into the
cheek of youth, as any it had ever been his lot to hear delivered.
A pretty birthday altogether, when Astronomy couldn't leave poor
Small Olympia Squires and me alone, but must put an end to our
loves! For, we never got over it; the threadbare Orrery outwore
our mutual tenderness; the man with the wand was too much for the
boy with the bow.
When shall I disconnect the combined smells of oranges, brown
paper, and straw, from those other birthdays at school, when the
coming hamper casts its shadow before, and when a week of social
harmony--shall I add of admiring and affectionate popularity--led
up to that Institution? What noble sentiments were expressed to me
in the days before the hamper, what vows of friendship were sworn
to me, what exceedingly old knives were given me, what generous
avowals of having been in the wrong emanated from else obstinate
spirits once enrolled among my enemies! The birthday of the potted
game and guava jelly, is still made special to me by the noble
conduct of Bully Globson. Letters from home had mysteriously
inquired whether I should be much surprised and disappointed if
among the treasures in the coming hamper I discovered potted game,
and guava jelly from the Western Indies. I had mentioned those
hints in confidence to a few friends, and had promised to give
away, as I now see reason to believe, a handsome covey of
partridges potted, and about a hundredweight of guava jelly. It
was now that Globson, Bully no more, sought me out in the
playground. He was a big fat boy, with a big fat head and a big
fat fist, and at the beginning of that Half had raised such a bump
on my forehead that I couldn't get my hat of state on, to go to
church. He said that after an interval of cool reflection (four
months) he now felt this blow to have been an error of judgment,
and that he wished to apologise for the same. Not only that, but
holding down his big head between his two big hands in order that I
might reach it conveniently, he requested me, as an act of justice
which would appease his awakened conscience, to raise a retributive
bump upon it, in the presence of witnesses. This handsome proposal
I modestly declined, and he then embraced me, and we walked away
conversing. We conversed respecting the West India Islands, and,
in the pursuit of knowledge he asked me with much interest whether
in the course of my reading I had met with any reliable description
of the mode of manufacturing guava jelly; or whether I had ever
happened to taste that conserve, which he had been given to
understand was of rare excellence.
Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty; and then with the waning
months came an ever augmenting sense of the dignity of twenty-one.
Heaven knows I had nothing to 'come into,' save the bare birthday,
and yet I esteemed it as a great possession. I now and then paved
the way to my state of dignity, by beginning a proposition with the
casual words, 'say that a man of twenty-one,' or by the incidental
assumption of a fact that could not sanely be disputed, as, 'for
when a fellow comes to be a man of twenty-one.' I gave a party on
the occasion. She was there. It is unnecessary to name Her, more
particularly; She was older than I, and had pervaded every chink
and crevice of my mind for three or four years. I had held volumes
of Imaginary Conversations with her mother on the subject of our
union, and I had written letters more in number than Horace
Walpole's, to that discreet woman, soliciting her daughter's hand
in marriage. I had never had the remotest intention of sending any
of those letters; but to write them, and after a few days tear them
up, had been a sublime occupation. Sometimes, I had begun
'Honoured Madam. I think that a lady gifted with those powers of
observation which I know you to possess, and endowed with those
womanly sympathies with the young and ardent which it were more
than heresy to doubt, can scarcely have failed to discover that I
love your adorable daughter, deeply, devotedly.' In less buoyant
states of mind I had begun, 'Bear with me, Dear Madam, bear with a
daring wretch who is about to make a surprising confession to you,
wholly unanticipated by yourself, and which he beseeches you to
commit to the flames as soon as you have become aware to what a
towering height his mad ambition soars.' At other times--periods
of profound mental depression, when She had gone out to balls where
I was not--the draft took the affecting form of a paper to be left
on my table after my departure to the confines of the globe. As
thus: 'For Mrs. Onowenever, these lines when the hand that traces
them shall be far away. I could not bear the daily torture of
hopelessly loving the dear one whom I will not name. Broiling on
the coast of Africa, or congealing on the shores of Greenland, I am
far far better there than here.' (In this sentiment my cooler
judgment perceives that the family of the beloved object would have
most completely concurred.) 'If I ever emerge from obscurity, and
my name is ever heralded by Fame, it will be for her dear sake. If
I ever amass Gold, it will be to pour it at her feet. Should I on
the other hand become the prey of Ravens--' I doubt if I ever
quite made up my mind what was to be done in that affecting case; I
tried 'then it is better so;' but not feeling convinced that it
would be better so, I vacillated between leaving all else blank,
which looked expressive and bleak, or winding up with 'Farewell!'
This fictitious correspondence of mine is to blame for the
foregoing digression. I was about to pursue the statement that on
my twenty-first birthday I gave a party, and She was there. It was
a beautiful party. There was not a single animate or inanimate
object connected with it (except the company and myself) that I had
ever seen before. Everything was hired, and the mercenaries in
attendance were profound strangers to me. Behind a door, in the
crumby part of the night when wine-glasses were to be found in
unexpected spots, I spoke to Her--spoke out to Her. What passed, I
cannot as a man of honour reveal. She was all angelical
gentleness, but a word was mentioned--a short and dreadful word of
three letters, beginning with a B- which, as I remarked at the
moment, 'scorched my brain.' She went away soon afterwards, and
when the hollow throng (though to be sure it was no fault of
theirs) dispersed, I issued forth, with a dissipated scorner, and,
as I mentioned expressly to him, 'sought oblivion.' It was found,
with a dreadful headache in it, but it didn't last; for, in the
shaming light of next day's noon, I raised my heavy head in bed,
looking back to the birthdays behind me, and tracking the circle by
which I had got round, after all, to the bitter powder and the
wretchedness again.
This reactionary powder (taken so largely by the human race I am
inclined to regard it as the Universal Medicine once sought for in
Laboratories) is capable of being made up in another form for
birthday use. Anybody's long-lost brother will do ill to turn up
on a birthday. If I had a long-lost brother I should know
beforehand that he would prove a tremendous fraternal failure if he
appointed to rush into my arms on my birthday. The first Magic
Lantern I ever saw, was secretly and elaborately planned to be the
great effect of a very juvenile birthday; but it wouldn't act, and
its images were dim. My experience of adult birthday Magic
Lanterns may possibly have been unfortunate, but has certainly been
similar. I have an illustrative birthday in my eye: a birthday of
my friend Flipfield, whose birthdays had long been remarkable as
social successes. There had been nothing set or formal about them;
Flipfield having been accustomed merely to say, two or three days
before, 'Don't forget to come and dine, old boy, according to
custom;'--I don't know what he said to the ladies he invited, but I
may safely assume it NOT to have been 'old girl.' Those were
delightful gatherings, and were enjoyed by all participators. In
an evil hour, a long-lost brother of Flipfield's came to light in
foreign parts. Where he had been hidden, or what he had been
doing, I don't know, for Flipfield vaguely informed me that he had
turned up 'on the banks of the Ganges'--speaking of him as if he
had been washed ashore. The Long-lost was coming home, and
Flipfield made an unfortunate calculation, based on the well-known
regularity of the P. and O. Steamers, that matters might be so
contrived as that the Long-lost should appear in the nick of time
on his (Flipfield's) birthday. Delicacy commanded that I should
repress the gloomy anticipations with which my soul became fraught
when I heard of this plan. The fatal day arrived, and we assembled
in force. Mrs. Flipfield senior formed an interesting feature in
the group, with a blue-veined miniature of the late Mr. Flipfield
round her neck, in an oval, resembling a tart from the
pastrycook's: his hair powdered, and the bright buttons on his
coat, evidently very like. She was accompanied by Miss Flipfield,
the eldest of her numerous family, who held her pocket-handkerchief
to her bosom in a majestic manner, and spoke to all of us (none of
us had ever seen her before), in pious and condoning tones, of all
the quarrels that had taken place in the family, from her infancy--
which must have been a long time ago--down to that hour. The Long-
lost did not appear. Dinner, half an hour later than usual, was
announced, and still no Long-lost. We sat down to table. The
knife and fork of the Long-lost made a vacuum in Nature, and when
the champagne came round for the first time, Flipfield gave him up
for the day, and had them removed. It was then that the Long-lost
gained the height of his popularity with the company; for my own
part, I felt convinced that I loved him dearly. Flipfield's
dinners are perfect, and he is the easiest and best of
entertainers. Dinner went on brilliantly, and the more the Long-
lost didn't come, the more comfortable we grew, and the more highly
we thought of him. Flipfield's own man (who has a regard for me)
was in the act of struggling with an ignorant stipendiary, to wrest
from him the wooden leg of a Guinea-fowl which he was pressing on
my acceptance, and to substitute a slice of the breast, when a
ringing at the door-bell suspended the strife. I looked round me,
and perceived the sudden pallor which I knew my own visage
revealed, reflected in the faces of the company. Flipfield
hurriedly excused himself, went out, was absent for about a minute
or two, and then re-entered with the Long-lost.
I beg to say distinctly that if the stranger had brought Mont Blanc
with him, or had come attended by a retinue of eternal snows, he
could not have chilled the circle to the marrow in a more efficient
manner. Embodied Failure sat enthroned upon the Long-lost's brow,
and pervaded him to his Long-lost boots. In vain Mrs. Flipfield
senior, opening her arms, exclaimed, 'My Tom!' and pressed his nose
against the counterfeit presentment of his other parent. In vain
Miss Flipfield, in the first transports of this re-union, showed
him a dint upon her maidenly cheek, and asked him if he remembered
when he did that with the bellows? We, the bystanders, were
overcome, but overcome by the palpable, undisguisable, utter, and
total break-down of the Long-lost. Nothing he could have done
would have set him right with us but his instant return to the
Ganges. In the very same moments it became established that the
feeling was reciprocal, and that the Long-lost detested us. When a
friend of the family (not myself, upon my honour), wishing to set
things going again, asked him, while he partook of soup--asked him
with an amiability of intention beyond all praise, but with a
weakness of execution open to defeat--what kind of river he
considered the Ganges, the Long-lost, scowling at the friend of the
family over his spoon, as one of an abhorrent race, replied, 'Why,
a river of water, I suppose,' and spooned his soup into himself
with a malignancy of hand and eye that blighted the amiable
questioner. Not an opinion could be elicited from the Long-lost,
in unison with the sentiments of any individual present. He
contradicted Flipfield dead, before he had eaten his salmon. He
had no idea--or affected to have no idea--that it was his brother's
birthday, and on the communication of that interesting fact to him,
merely wanted to make him out four years older than he was. He was
an antipathetical being, with a peculiar power and gift of treading
on everybody's tenderest place. They talk in America of a man's
'Platform.' I should describe the Platform of the Long-lost as a
Platform composed of other people's corns, on which he had stumped
his way, with all his might and main, to his present position. It
is needless to add that Flipfield's great birthday went by the
board, and that he was a wreck when I pretended at parting to wish
him many happy returns of it.
There is another class of birthdays at which I have so frequently
assisted, that I may assume such birthdays to be pretty well known
to the human race. My friend Mayday's birthday is an example. The
guests have no knowledge of one another except on that one day in
the year, and are annually terrified for a week by the prospect of
meeting one another again. There is a fiction among us that we
have uncommon reasons for being particularly lively and spirited on
the occasion, whereas deep despondency is no phrase for the
expression of our feelings. But the wonderful feature of the case
is, that we are in tacit accordance to avoid the subject--to keep
it as far off as possible, as long as possible--and to talk about
anything else, rather than the joyful event. I may even go so far
as to assert that there is a dumb compact among us that we will
pretend that it is NOT Mayday's birthday. A mysterious and gloomy
Being, who is said to have gone to school with Mayday, and who is
so lank and lean that he seriously impugns the Dietary of the
establishment at which they were jointly educated, always leads us,
as I may say, to the block, by laying his grisly hand on a decanter
and begging us to fill our glasses. The devices and pretences that
I have seen put in practice to defer the fatal moment, and to
interpose between this man and his purpose, are innumerable. I
have known desperate guests, when they saw the grisly hand
approaching the decanter, wildly to begin, without any antecedent
whatsoever, 'That reminds me--' and to plunge into long stories.
When at last the hand and the decanter come together, a shudder, a
palpable perceptible shudder, goes round the table. We receive the
reminder that it is Mayday's birthday, as if it were the
anniversary of some profound disgrace he had undergone, and we
sought to comfort him. And when we have drunk Mayday's health, and
wished him many happy returns, we are seized for some moments with
a ghastly blitheness, an unnatural levity, as if we were in the
first flushed reaction of having undergone a surgical operation.
Birthdays of this species have a public as well as a private phase.
My 'boyhood's home,' Dullborough, presents a case in point. An
Immortal Somebody was wanted in Dullborough, to dimple for a day
the stagnant face of the waters; he was rather wanted by
Dullborough generally, and much wanted by the principal hotel-
keeper. The County history was looked up for a locally Immortal
Somebody, but the registered Dullborough worthies were all
Nobodies. In this state of things, it is hardly necessary to
record that Dullborough did what every man does when he wants to
write a book or deliver a lecture, and is provided with all the
materials except a subject. It fell back upon Shakespeare.
No sooner was it resolved to celebrate Shakespeare's birthday in
Dullborough, than the popularity of the immortal bard became
surprising. You might have supposed the first edition of his works
to have been published last week, and enthusiastic Dullborough to
have got half through them. (I doubt, by the way, whether it had
ever done half that, but that is a private opinion.) A young
gentleman with a sonnet, the retention of which for two years had
enfeebled his mind and undermined his knees, got the sonnet into
the Dullborough Warden, and gained flesh. Portraits of Shakespeare
broke out in the bookshop windows, and our principal artist painted
a large original portrait in oils for the decoration of the dining-
room. It was not in the least like any of the other Portraits, and
was exceedingly admired, the head being much swollen. At the
Institution, the Debating Society discussed the new question, Was
there sufficient ground for supposing that the Immortal Shakespeare
ever stole deer? This was indignantly decided by an overwhelming
majority in the negative; indeed, there was but one vote on the
Poaching side, and that was the vote of the orator who had
undertaken to advocate it, and who became quite an obnoxious
character--particularly to the Dullborough 'roughs,' who were about
as well informed on the matter as most other people. Distinguished
speakers were invited down, and very nearly came (but not quite).
Subscriptions were opened, and committees sat, and it would have
been far from a popular measure in the height of the excitement, to
have told Dullborough that it wasn't Stratford-upon-Avon. Yet,
after all these preparations, when the great festivity took place,
and the portrait, elevated aloft, surveyed the company as if it
were in danger of springing a mine of intellect and blowing itself
up, it did undoubtedly happen, according to the inscrutable
mysteries of things, that nobody could be induced, not to say to
touch upon Shakespeare, but to come within a mile of him, until the
crack speaker of Dullborough rose to propose the immortal memory.
Which he did with the perplexing and astonishing result that before
he had repeated the great name half-a-dozen times, or had been upon
his legs as many minutes, he was assailed with a general shout of
'Question.' _
Read next: CHAPTER XXI - THE SHORT-TIMERS
Read previous: CHAPTER XIX - SOME RECOLLECTIONS OF MORTALITY
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