Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of 'Eighty
of this profanity would be the immediate descent of the four-post
bedstead on the second floor, together with the best sitting-room on the
first; but no visible judgment occurring, she heaved a deep sigh, and
begged her husband, in a tone of resignation, to go on, and by all means
to blaspheme as much as possible, because he knew she liked it.
The locksmith did for a moment seem disposed to gratify her, but he gave
a great gulp, and mildly rejoined:
‘I was going to say, what on earth do you call it unchristian for?
Which would be most unchristian, Martha--to sit quietly down and let our
houses be sacked by a foreign army, or to turn out like men and drive
‘em off? Shouldn’t I be a nice sort of a Christian, if I crept into
a corner of my own chimney and looked on while a parcel of whiskered
savages bore off Dolly--or you?’
When he said ‘or you,’ Mrs Varden, despite herself, relaxed into a
smile. There was something complimentary in the idea. ‘In such a state
of things as that, indeed--’ she simpered.
‘As that!’ repeated the locksmith. ‘Well, that would be the state of
things directly. Even Miggs would go. Some black tambourine-player,
with a great turban on, would be bearing HER off, and, unless the
tambourine-player was proof against kicking and scratching, it’s
my belief he’d have the worst of it. Ha ha ha! I’d forgive the
tambourine-player. I wouldn’t have him interfered with on any account,
poor fellow.’ And here the locksmith laughed again so heartily, that
tears came into his eyes--much to Mrs Varden’s indignation, who thought
the capture of so sound a Protestant and estimable a private character
as Miggs by a pagan negro, a circumstance too shocking and awful for
contemplation.
The picture Gabriel had drawn, indeed, threatened serious consequences,
and would indubitably have led to them, but luckily at that moment a
light footstep crossed the threshold, and Dolly, running in, threw her
arms round her old father’s neck and hugged him tight.
‘Here she is at last!’ cried Gabriel. ‘And how well you look, Doll, and
how late you are, my darling!’
How well she looked? Well? Why, if he had exhausted every laudatory
adjective in the dictionary, it wouldn’t have been praise enough. When
and where was there ever such a plump, roguish, comely, bright-eyed,
enticing, bewitching, captivating, maddening little puss in all this
world, as Dolly! What was the Dolly of five years ago, to the Dolly of
that day! How many coachmakers, saddlers, cabinet-makers, and professors
of other useful arts, had deserted their fathers, mothers, sisters,
brothers, and, most of all, their cousins, for the love of her! How many
unknown gentlemen--supposed to be of mighty fortunes, if not titles--had
waited round the corner after dark, and tempted Miggs the incorruptible,
with golden guineas, to deliver offers of marriage folded up in
love-letters! How many disconsolate fathers and substantial tradesmen
had waited on the locksmith for the same purpose, with dismal tales of
how their sons had lost their appetites, and taken to shut themselves up
in dark bedrooms, and wandering in desolate suburbs with pale faces,
and all because of Dolly Varden’s loveliness and cruelty! How many
young men, in all previous times of unprecedented steadiness, had turned
suddenly wild and wicked for the same reason, and, in an ecstasy of
unrequited love, taken to wrench off door-knockers, and invert the boxes
of rheumatic watchmen! How had she recruited the king’s service, both
by sea and land, through rendering desperate his loving subjects between
the ages of eighteen and twenty-five! How many young ladies had publicly
professed, with tears in their eyes, that for their tastes she was much
too short, too tall, too bold, too cold, too stout, too thin, too fair,
too dark--too everything but handsome! How many old ladies, taking
counsel together, had thanked Heaven their daughters were not like her,
and had hoped she might come to no harm, and had thought she would come
to no good, and had wondered what people saw in her, and had arrived at
the conclusion that she was ‘going off’ in her looks, or had never
come on in them, and that she was a thorough imposition and a popular
mistake!
And yet here was this same Dolly Varden, so whimsical and hard to please
that she was Dolly Varden still, all smiles and dimples and pleasant
looks, and caring no more for the fifty or sixty young fellows who at
that very moment were breaking their hearts to marry her, than if so
many oysters had been crossed in love and opened afterwards.
Dolly hugged her father as has been already stated, and having hugged
her mother also, accompanied both into the little parlour where the
cloth was already laid for dinner, and where Miss Miggs--a trifle more
rigid and bony than of yore--received her with a sort of hysterical
gasp, intended for a smile. Into the hands of that young virgin, she
delivered her bonnet and walking dress (all of a dreadful, artful,
and designing kind), and then said with a laugh, which rivalled the
locksmith’s music, ‘How glad I always am to be at home again!’
‘And how glad we always are, Doll,’ said her father, putting back the
dark hair from her sparkling eyes, ‘to have you at home. Give me a
kiss.’
If there had been anybody of the male kind there to see her do it--but
there was not--it was a mercy.
‘I don’t like your being at the Warren,’ said the locksmith, ‘I can’t
bear to have you out of my sight. And what is the news over yonder,
Doll?’
‘What news there is, I think you know already,’ replied his daughter. ‘I
am sure you do though.’
‘Ay?’ cried the locksmith. ‘What’s that?’
‘Come, come,’ said Dolly, ‘you know very well. I want you to tell me why
Mr Haredale--oh, how gruff he is again, to be sure!--has been away from
home for some days past, and why he is travelling about (we know he IS
travelling, because of his letters) without telling his own niece why or
wherefore.’
‘Miss Emma doesn’t want to know, I’ll swear,’ returned the locksmith.
‘I don’t know that,’ said Dolly; ‘but I do, at any rate. Do tell me. Why
is he so secret, and what is this ghost story, which nobody is to tell
Miss Emma, and which seems to be mixed up with his going away? Now I see
you know by your colouring so.’
‘What the story means, or is, or has to do with it, I know no more than
you, my dear,’ returned the locksmith, ‘except that it’s some foolish
fear of little Solomon’s--which has, indeed, no meaning in it, I
suppose. As to Mr Haredale’s journey, he goes, as I believe--’
‘Yes,’ said Dolly.
‘As I believe,’ resumed the locksmith, pinching her cheek, ‘on business,
Doll. What it may be, is quite another matter. Read Blue Beard, and
don’t be too curious, pet; it’s no business of yours or mine, depend
upon that; and here’s dinner, which is much more to the purpose.’
Dolly might have remonstrated against this summary dismissal of the
subject, notwithstanding the appearance of dinner, but at the mention
of Blue Beard Mrs Varden interposed, protesting she could not find it
in her conscience to sit tamely by, and hear her child recommended to
peruse the adventures of a Turk and Mussulman--far less of a fabulous
Turk, which she considered that potentate to be. She held that, in such
stirring and tremendous times as those in which they lived, it would
be much more to the purpose if Dolly became a regular subscriber to the
Thunderer, where she would have an opportunity of reading Lord George
Gordon’s speeches word for word, which would be a greater comfort and
solace to her, than a hundred and fifty Blue Beards ever could impart.
She appealed in support of this proposition to Miss Miggs, then in
waiting, who said that indeed the peace of mind she had derived from the
perusal of that paper generally, but especially of one article of the
very last week as ever was, entitled ‘Great Britain drenched in gore,’
exceeded all belief; the same composition, she added, had also wrought
such a comforting effect on the mind of a married sister of hers, then
resident at Golden Lion Court, number twenty-sivin, second bell-handle
on the right-hand door-post, that, being in a delicate state of health,
and in fact expecting an addition to her family, she had been seized
with fits directly after its perusal, and had raved of the Inquisition
ever since; to the great improvement of her husband and friends. Miss
Miggs went on to say that she would recommend all those whose hearts
were hardened to hear Lord George themselves, whom she commended first,
in respect of his steady Protestantism, then of his oratory, then of
his eyes, then of his nose, then of his legs, and lastly of his figure
generally, which she looked upon as fit for any statue, prince, or
angel, to which sentiment Mrs Varden fully subscribed.
Mrs Varden having cut in, looked at a box upon the mantelshelf, painted
in imitation of a very red-brick dwelling-house, with a yellow roof;
having at top a real chimney, down which voluntary subscribers dropped
their silver, gold, or pence, into the parlour; and on the door the
counterfeit presentment of a brass plate, whereon was legibly inscribed
‘Protestant Association:’--and looking at it, said, that it was to her
a source of poignant misery to think that Varden never had, of all his
substance, dropped anything into that temple, save once in secret--as
she afterwards discovered--two fragments of tobacco-pipe, which she
hoped would not be put down to his last account. That Dolly, she was
grieved to say, was no less backward in her contributions, better
loving, as it seemed, to purchase ribbons and such gauds, than to
encourage the great cause, then in such heavy tribulation; and that she
did entreat her (her father she much feared could not be moved) not to
despise, but imitate, the bright example of Miss Miggs, who flung her
wages, as it were, into the very countenance of the Pope, and bruised
his features with her quarter’s money.
‘Oh, mim,’ said Miggs, ‘don’t relude to that. I had no intentions, mim,
that nobody should know. Such sacrifices as I can make, are quite a
widder’s mite. It’s all I have,’ cried Miggs with a great burst of
tears--for with her they never came on by degrees--‘but it’s made up to
me in other ways; it’s well made up.’
This was quite true, though not perhaps in the sense that Miggs
intended. As she never failed to keep her self-denial full in Mrs
Varden’s view, it drew forth so many gifts of caps and gowns and other
articles of dress, that upon the whole the red-brick house was perhaps
the best investment for her small capital she could possibly have hit
upon; returning her interest, at the rate of seven or eight per cent in
money, and fifty at least in personal repute and credit.
‘You needn’t cry, Miggs,’ said Mrs Varden, herself in tears; ‘you
needn’t be ashamed of it, though your poor mistress IS on the same
side.’
Miggs howled at this remark, in a peculiarly dismal way, and said she
knowed that master hated her. That it was a dreadful thing to live in
families and have dislikes, and not give satisfactions. That to make
divisions was a thing she could not abear to think of, neither could her
feelings let her do it. That if it was master’s wishes as she and him
should part, it was best they should part, and she hoped he might be
the happier for it, and always wished him well, and that he might find
somebody as would meet his dispositions. It would be a hard trial, she
said, to part from such a missis, but she could meet any suffering when
her conscience told her she was in the rights, and therefore she was
willing even to go that lengths. She did not think, she added, that she
could long survive the separations, but, as she was hated and looked
upon unpleasant, perhaps her dying as soon as possible would be the best