Read Ebook: Harper's New Monthly Magazine Vol. 3 July 1851 by Various

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The king tooke us by surprise this morning: mother had scarce time to slip on her scarlett gown and coif, ere he was in y^e house. His grace was mighty pleasant to all, and, at going, saluted all round, which Bessy took humourously, Daisy immoveablie, Mercy humblie, I distastefullie, and mother delightedlie. She calls him a fine man; he is indeede big enough, and like to become too big; with long slits of eyes that gaze freelie on all, as who shoulde say "Who dare let or hinder us?" His brow betokens sense and franknesse, his eyebrows are supercilious, and his cheeks puffy. A rolling, straddling gait, and abrupt speech.

'Tother evening, as father and I were, unwontedly, strolling together down the lane, there accosts us a shabby poor fellow, with something unsettled in his eye....

"Master, sir knight, and may it please your judgeship, my name is Patteson."

"Very likely," says father, "and my name is More, but what is that to the purpose?"

"Why, soe I mighte," says father, "but how shoulde I have proved it?"

"You who are a lawyer shoulde know best about that," rejoyned the poor knave; "'tis too hard for poor Patteson."

"Well, but who are you?" says father, "and what do you want of me?"

"Don't you mind me?" says Patteson; "I played Hold-your-tongue, last Christmasse revel was five years, and they called me a smart chap then, but last Martinmasse I fell from y^e church steeple, and shook my brain-pan, I think, for its contents have seemed addled ever since; soe what I want now is to be made a fool."

"Then you are not one now?" says father.

"Why, like cleaves to like, you know they say," says father.

"Aye," says 'tother, "but I've reason and feeling enow, too, to know you are no fool, though I thoughte you might want one. Great people like 'em at their tables, I've hearde say, though I am sure I can't guesse why, for it makes me sad to see fools laughed at; ne'erthelesse, as I get laughed at alreadie, methinketh I may as well get paid for the job if I can, being unable, now, to doe a stroke of work in hot weather. And I'm the onlie son of my mother, and she is a widow. But perhaps I'm not bad enough."

"I know not that, poor knave," says father, touched with quick pity, "and, for those that laugh at fools, my opinion, Patteson, is, that they are the greater fools who laugh. To tell you the truth, I had had noe mind to take a fool into mine establishment, having always had a fancy to be prime fooler in it myselfe; however, you incline me to change my purpose, for, as I said anon, like cleaves to like, soe I'll tell you what we will doe--divide the businesse and goe halves--I continuing the fooling, and thou receiving the salary; that is, if I find, on inquiry, thou art given to noe vice, including that of scurrillitie."

"May it like your goodness," says poor Patteson, "I've been the subject, oft, of scurrillitie, and affect it too little to offend that way myself. I ever keep a civil tongue in my head, 'specially among young ladies."

"That minds me," says father, "of a butler who sayd he always was sober, especially when he had cold water to drink. Can you read and write?"

"Well, and what if I cannot?" returns Patteson, "there ne'er was but one, I ever heard of, that knew letters, never having learnt, and well he might, for he made them that made them."

"Meg, there is sense in this poor fellow," says father, "we will have him home and be kind to him."

And, sure enow, we have done so and been so ever since.

A glance at the anteceding pages of this libellus me-sheweth poor Will Roper at y^e season his love-fitt for me was at its height. He troubleth me with it no longer, nor with his religious disquietations. Hard studdy of the law hath filled his head with other matters, and made him infinitely more rationall, and by consequents, more agreeable. 'Twas one of those preferences young people sometimes manifest, themselves know neither why nor wherefore, and are shamed, afterwards, to be reminded of. I'm sure I shall ne'er remind him. There was nothing in me to fix a rational or passionate regard. I have neither Bess's witt nor white teeth, nor Daisy's dark eyes, nor Mercy's dimple. A plain-favoured girl, with changefulle spiritts--that's alle.

Patteson's latest jest was taking precedence of father yesterday, with the saying, "Give place, brother; you are but jester to King Harry, and I'm jester to Sir Thomas More; I'll leave you to decide which is y^e greater man of the two."

"Why, gossip," cries father, "his grace woulde make two of me."

"Not a bit of it," returns Patteson, "he's big enow for two such as you are, I grant ye, but the king can't make two of you. No! lords and commons may make a king, but a king can't make a Sir Thomas More."

"But what I mean is," persists the fool, "that the king can't make such another as you are, any more than all the king's horses and all the king's men can put Humty-dumty together again, which is an ancient riddle, and full of marrow. And soe he'll find, if ever he lifts thy head off from thy shoulders, which God forbid."

Father delighteth in sparring with Patteson far more than in jesting with y^e king, whom he alwaies looks on as a lion that may, any minute, fall on him and rend him. Whereas, with 'tother, he ungirds his mind. Their banter commonly exceeds not plesantrie, but Patteson is ne'er without an answer, and although, maybe, each amuses himselfe now and then with thinking, "I'll put him up with such a question," yet, once begun, the skein runs off the reel without a knot, and shews the excellent nature of both, soe free are they alike from malice and over-license. Sometimes their cuts are neater than common listeners apprehend. I've seen Rupert and Will, in fencing, make their swords flash in the sun at every parry and thrust; agayn, owing to some change in mine owne position, or the decline of y^e sun, the scintillations have escaped me, though I've known their rays must have been emitted in some quarter alle the same.

Patteson, with one of Argus's cast feathers in his hand, is at this moment beneath my lattice, astride on a stone balustrade, while Bessy, whom he much affects, is sitting on the steps, feeding her peacocks. Sayth Patteson, "Canst tell me, mistress, why peacocks have soe manie eyes in theire tails, and yet can onlie see with two in theire heads?"

"Because those two make them so vain alreadie, fool," says Bess, "that were they always beholding theire own glory, they would be intolerable."

"And besides that," says Patteson, "the less we see or heare, either, of what passes behind our backs, the better for us, since knaves will make mouths at us then, for as glorious as we may be. Canst tell me, mistress, why the peacock was the last bird that went into the ark?"

"First tell me, fool," returns Bess, "how thou knowest that it was soe?"

"Nay, a fool may ask a question w^d puzzle a wiseard to answer," rejoyns Patteson; "I mighte ask you, for example, where they got theire fresh kitchen-stuff in the ark, or whether the birds ate other than grains, or the wild beasts other than flesh. It needs must have been a granary."

"We ne'er shew ourselves such fools," says Bess, "as in seeking to know more than is written. They had enough, if none to spare, and we scarce can tell how little is enough for bare sustenance in a state of perfect inaction. If the creatures were kept low, they were all y^e less fierce."

"Well answered, mistress," says Patteson; "but tell me, why do you wear two crosses?"

"Nay, fool," returns Bess, "I wear but one."

"Oh, but I say you wear two," says Patteson, "one at your girdle, and one that nobody sees. We alle wear the unseen one, you know. Some have theirs of gold, alle carven and shaped, soe as you hardlie tell it for a cross ... like my lord cardinall, for instance ... but it is one, for alle that. And others, of iron, that eateth into their hearts ... methinketh Master Roper's must be one of 'em. For me, I'm content with one of wood, like that our deare Lord bore; what was goode enow for him is goode enow for me, and I've noe temptation to shew it, as it isn't fine, nor yet to chafe at it for being rougher than my neighbour's, nor yet to make myself a second because it is not hard enow. Doe you take me, mistress?"

"I take you for what you are," says Bess, "a poor fool."

"Nay, niece," says Patteson, "my brother your father hath made me rich."

"I mean," says Bess, "you have more wisdom than witt, and a real fool has neither, therefore you are only a make-believe fool."

"Well, there are many make-believe sages," says Patteson; "for mine owne part, I never aim to be thoughte a Hiccius Doccius."

"A hic est doctus, fool, you mean," interrupts Bess.

"Perhaps I do," rejoins Patteson, "since other folks soe oft know better what we mean than we know ourselves. Alle I woulde say is, I ne'er set up for a conjuror. One can see as far into a millstone as other people without being that. For example, when a man is overta'en with qualms of conscience for having married his brother's widow, when she is noe longer soe young and fair as she was a score of years ago, we know what that's a sign of. And when an Ipswich butcher's son takes on him the state of my lord pope, we know what that's a sign of. Nay, if a young gentlewoman become dainty at her sizes, and sluttish in her apparel, we ... as I live, here comes John Heron with a fish in's mouth."

Poor Bess involuntarilie turned her head quicklie towards y^e watergate, on which Patteson, laughing as he lay on his back, points upward with his peacock's feather, and cries, "Overhead, mistress! see, there he goes. Sure, you lookt not to see Master Heron making towards us between y^e posts and flower-pots, eating a dried ling?" laughing as wildly as though he were verily a natural.

Bess, without a word, shook the crumbs from her lap, and was turning into the house, when he witholds her a minute in a perfectly altered fashion, saying, "There be some works, mistress, our confessors tell us be works of supererogation ... is not that y^e word? I learn a long one now and then ... such as be setting food before a full man, or singing to a deaf one, or buying for one's pigs a silver trough, or, for the matter of that, casting pearls before a dunghill cock, or fishing for a heron, which is well able to fish for itself, and is an ill-natured bird after all, that pecks the hand of his mistress, and, for all her kindness to him, will not think of Bessy More."

How apt alle are to abuse unlimited license? Yet 'twas good counsel.

PHANTOMS AND REALITIES.--AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

PART THE THIRD--NIGHT.

The whole color of my life was changed in a single night. Years of excitement could not have wrought such a miracle upon me. The next day, I seemed to have passed out of my former self into a new individual and a new state of existence. I was no longer alone! I was no longer drifting about, aimless and dreamy. There was work for me to do, and the interest I had in it was vivid and engrossing.

What had become of the dwarf? Not a trace of him was to be found. I examined the grass, and fancied I could detect two or three dark spots; but there had been heavy showers in the night, and as the mould had been thrown up here and there, discoloring the verdure, I could not determine whether these spots were blood-marks, as I feared, or the mere beating of rain and mire. But I did not trouble myself any further. Our persecutor was gone. That was all we cared to be assured of; and our next step was to escape from a place in which it was no longer safe for us to remain.

That mournful voice was still in my ears; but the consciousness of danger, the sense of triumph, the selfishness of happiness, out-clamored it! Destined as it was to return in after-years in tones that always seemed more piteous and more laden with pain and bitterness as that miserable night receded further and further back into the darkness of the past, it came upon me the next morning with something of a feeling of asperity and antagonism. There was yet the risk that the dwarf might re-appear, and as every thing concerning his rights and his probable mode of proceeding was vague and uncertain, we were much more occupied in thinking of our own security, than of his sufferings or wrongs. Indeed, under the influence of the feelings that actuated us then, we were strongly impressed with the conviction that the wrongs were all on our side, and that whatever he might have suffered, was nothing more than a measure of just punishment for having inflicted them.

People who do a wrong seldom have any difficulty in finding out excuses and justifications for it. We certainly had abundant ground to complain of the conduct of poor Mephistophiles. We were not aware that in those moments of irritation and revenge we exaggerated his faults, and palliated our own. We could see every thing he had done that was harsh, or disagreeable, or unjust; we could see nothing we had done ourselves that was not forced upon us in self-defense, and capable of vindication. We had acted all throughout, upon a necessity he had woven round us like a net. We were, in fact, the victims, and he was the cool, crafty, heartless tempter and persecutor. We did all we could to forget the brief gleam of humanity he had betrayed the evening before. What was that, weighed against years of oppression and cruelty? And even if we were inclined to admit that it showed his character in rather a better light, it came too late to be entitled to any consideration from us. If he had been capable of such manly feelings, why did he not exhibit them sooner? But the truth was, we affected not to believe in the genuineness of his emotions. He was such an habitual mimic, that he could assume any mood that suited the occasion, and nobody could tell whether he was in earnest or not, which warranted us in supposing that the whole of that wild burst of passionate reproaches, apparently welling up out of baffled and imploring love, might have been put on like any other piece of cunning gesticulation.

I was quite willing to believe that the deep and harrowing emotion he exhibited was mere acting, or at least a passing spasm of wounded vanity, or even of love in its dying throes. It was comfortable to suppose that he had endeavored to impose upon me to the last, to gull and outrage me. I wanted some such apology to myself for hating him, with that heart-rending cry rising up out of the earth, and ascending in accents of unutterable grief to heaven! It was needful that I should hate and despise him during the first few hours of that violent transition which was to alter the whole face of things, and project me into a new life, in which occupation and intercourse were to be displaced by lonely wanderings and the isolation of the heart. It was needful that I should have some strong sophism to bridge over the gulf that was henceforth to yawn between me and mankind; and I felt that this detestation of the dwarf was a link that still connected me with the world I had forsaken.

I had not courage enough to attempt to do any justice to him. I did not dare to imagine what his agonies must have been, if, indeed, he still lived. I was plumed with conquest: he was crushed. I could only fancy him crawling, bleeding, and straining himself along the earth, to creep away and hide himself, and leave me to my happiness. But to relieve this image of its appealing claims upon my pity or remorse, to arm myself against a possibility of relenting, I associated this figure of the wretch groveling out of sight with all that was venomous and treacherous in the nature of reptiles. I refused to consider him human. Had I dared to look into his heart--now that the wretch's last hope was extinct--to gaze upon the misery which filled it to overflowing, if, indeed, he were not dead, and his heart broken, how could I have held my head erect, and looked into Astraea's face with eyes that rained joy, and pride, and exultation into hers?

Some sorts of happiness are essentially cruel and selfish. Such was hers--such was mine. We knew it; yet, although our natures were not originally hard or narrow, we would not suffer ourselves to be generous even in our thoughts toward him we had wronged. We were afraid to trust our feelings in that direction.

Few questions passed between us that morning. We knew by instinct what was before us, and what it was necessary for each of us to do. We had a mutual terror that he was dead, but we did not give it utterance; there was no need. We knew that the same fear was in both our minds, and we tried to avoid it. We imagined that we ought to be very cheerful, and banish all gloomy and distressing subjects. It was a kind of hymeneal day with us! There were wild altars in our thoughts, hung with garlands, and lighted up by sunshine; and to these we brought our vows and offerings, and all the mirth and gayety, without much speech, we could summon into our looks. There was a visible effort in all this at both sides; but notwithstanding the ghastly hand, smeared with blood, that seemed every now and then to come out of the darkness of the night, and hold us back, our jubilee rode out the day valiantly.

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