Hard Times
nicest and coldest calculation; and it was not without cause that Mrs.
Sparsit habitually observed of him, that he was a young man of the
steadiest principle she had ever known. Having satisfied himself, on his
father’s death, that his mother had a right of settlement in Coketown,
this excellent young economist had asserted that right for her with such
a steadfast adherence to the principle of the case, that she had been
shut up in the workhouse ever since. It must be admitted that he allowed
her half a pound of tea a year, which was weak in him: first, because all
gifts have an inevitable tendency to pauperise the recipient, and
secondly, because his only reasonable transaction in that commodity would
have been to buy it for as little as he could possibly give, and sell it
for as much as he could possibly get; it having been clearly ascertained
by philosophers that in this is comprised the whole duty of man—not a
part of man’s duty, but the whole.
‘Pretty fair, ma’am. With the usual exception, ma’am,’ repeated Bitzer.
‘Ah—h!’ said Mrs. Sparsit, shaking her head over her tea-cup, and taking
a long gulp.
‘Mr. Thomas, ma’am, I doubt Mr. Thomas very much, ma’am, I don’t like his
ways at all.’
‘Bitzer,’ said Mrs. Sparsit, in a very impressive manner, ‘do you
recollect my having said anything to you respecting names?’
‘I beg your pardon, ma’am. It’s quite true that you did object to names
being used, and they’re always best avoided.’
‘Please to remember that I have a charge here,’ said Mrs. Sparsit, with
her air of state. ‘I hold a trust here, Bitzer, under Mr. Bounderby.
However improbable both Mr. Bounderby and myself might have deemed it
years ago, that he would ever become my patron, making me an annual
compliment, I cannot but regard him in that light. From Mr. Bounderby I
have received every acknowledgment of my social station, and every
recognition of my family descent, that I could possibly expect. More,
far more. Therefore, to my patron I will be scrupulously true. And I do
not consider, I will not consider, I cannot consider,’ said Mrs. Sparsit,
with a most extensive stock on hand of honour and morality, ‘that I
_should_ be scrupulously true, if I allowed names to be mentioned under
this roof, that are unfortunately—most unfortunately—no doubt of
that—connected with his.’
Bitzer knuckled his forehead again, and again begged pardon.
‘No, Bitzer,’ continued Mrs. Sparsit, ‘say an individual, and I will hear
you; say Mr. Thomas, and you must excuse me.’
‘With the usual exception, ma’am,’ said Bitzer, trying back, ‘of an
individual.’
‘Ah—h!’ Mrs. Sparsit repeated the ejaculation, the shake of the head
over her tea-cup, and the long gulp, as taking up the conversation again
at the point where it had been interrupted.
‘An individual, ma’am,’ said Bitzer, ‘has never been what he ought to
have been, since he first came into the place. He is a dissipated,
extravagant idler. He is not worth his salt, ma’am. He wouldn’t get it
either, if he hadn’t a friend and relation at court, ma’am!’
‘Ah—h!’ said Mrs. Sparsit, with another melancholy shake of her head.
‘I only hope, ma’am,’ pursued Bitzer, ‘that his friend and relation may
not supply him with the means of carrying on. Otherwise, ma’am, we know
out of whose pocket _that_ money comes.’
‘Ah—h!’ sighed Mrs. Sparsit again, with another melancholy shake of her
head.
‘He is to be pitied, ma’am. The last party I have alluded to, is to be
pitied, ma’am,’ said Bitzer.
‘Yes, Bitzer,’ said Mrs. Sparsit. ‘I have always pitied the delusion,
always.’
‘As to an individual, ma’am,’ said Bitzer, dropping his voice and drawing
nearer, ‘he is as improvident as any of the people in this town. And you
know what _their_ improvidence is, ma’am. No one could wish to know it
better than a lady of your eminence does.’
‘They would do well,’ returned Mrs. Sparsit, ‘to take example by you,
Bitzer.’
‘Thank you, ma’am. But, since you do refer to me, now look at me, ma’am.
I have put by a little, ma’am, already. That gratuity which I receive at
Christmas, ma’am: I never touch it. I don’t even go the length of my
wages, though they’re not high, ma’am. Why can’t they do as I have done,
ma’am? What one person can do, another can do.’
This, again, was among the fictions of Coketown. Any capitalist there,
who had made sixty thousand pounds out of sixpence, always professed to
wonder why the sixty thousand nearest Hands didn’t each make sixty
thousand pounds out of sixpence, and more or less reproached them every
one for not accomplishing the little feat. What I did you can do. Why
don’t you go and do it?
‘As to their wanting recreations, ma’am,’ said Bitzer, ‘it’s stuff and
nonsense. _I_ don’t want recreations. I never did, and I never shall; I
don’t like ’em. As to their combining together; there are many of them,
I have no doubt, that by watching and informing upon one another could
earn a trifle now and then, whether in money or good will, and improve
their livelihood. Then, why don’t they improve it, ma’am! It’s the
first consideration of a rational creature, and it’s what they pretend to
want.’
‘Pretend indeed!’ said Mrs. Sparsit.
‘I am sure we are constantly hearing, ma’am, till it becomes quite
nauseous, concerning their wives and families,’ said Bitzer. ‘Why look
at me, ma’am! I don’t want a wife and family. Why should they?’
‘Because they are improvident,’ said Mrs. Sparsit.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ returned Bitzer, ‘that’s where it is. If they were more
provident and less perverse, ma’am, what would they do? They would say,
“While my hat covers my family,” or “while my bonnet covers my
family,”—as the case might be, ma’am—“I have only one to feed, and that’s
the person I most like to feed.”’
‘To be sure,’ assented Mrs. Sparsit, eating muffin.
‘Thank you, ma’am,’ said Bitzer, knuckling his forehead again, in return
for the favour of Mrs. Sparsit’s improving conversation. ‘Would you wish
a little more hot water, ma’am, or is there anything else that I could
fetch you?’
‘Nothing just now, Bitzer.’
‘Thank you, ma’am. I shouldn’t wish to disturb you at your meals, ma’am,
particularly tea, knowing your partiality for it,’ said Bitzer, craning a
little to look over into the street from where he stood; ‘but there’s a
gentleman been looking up here for a minute or so, ma’am, and he has come
across as if he was going to knock. That _is_ his knock, ma’am, no
doubt.’
He stepped to the window; and looking out, and drawing in his head again,
confirmed himself with, ‘Yes, ma’am. Would you wish the gentleman to be
shown in, ma’am?’
‘I don’t know who it can be,’ said Mrs. Sparsit, wiping her mouth and
arranging her mittens.
‘A stranger, ma’am, evidently.’
‘What a stranger can want at the Bank at this time of the evening, unless
he comes upon some business for which he is too late, I don’t know,’ said
Mrs. Sparsit, ‘but I hold a charge in this establishment from Mr.
Bounderby, and I will never shrink from it. If to see him is any part of
the duty I have accepted, I will see him. Use your own discretion,
Bitzer.’
Here the visitor, all unconscious of Mrs. Sparsit’s magnanimous words,
repeated his knock so loudly that the light porter hastened down to open
the door; while Mrs. Sparsit took the precaution of concealing her little
table, with all its appliances upon it, in a cupboard, and then decamped
up-stairs, that she might appear, if needful, with the greater dignity.
‘If you please, ma’am, the gentleman would wish to see you,’ said Bitzer,
with his light eye at Mrs. Sparsit’s keyhole. So, Mrs. Sparsit, who had
improved the interval by touching up her cap, took her classical features
down-stairs again, and entered the board-room in the manner of a Roman
matron going outside the city walls to treat with an invading general.
The visitor having strolled to the window, and being then engaged in
looking carelessly out, was as unmoved by this impressive entry as man
could possibly be. He stood whistling to himself with all imaginable
coolness, with his hat still on, and a certain air of exhaustion upon
him, in part arising from excessive summer, and in part from excessive
gentility. For it was to be seen with half an eye that he was a thorough
gentleman, made to the model of the time; weary of everything, and
putting no more faith in anything than Lucifer.
‘I believe, sir,’ quoth Mrs. Sparsit, ‘you wished to see me.’
‘I beg your pardon,’ he said, turning and removing his hat; ‘pray excuse
me.’
‘Humph!’ thought Mrs. Sparsit, as she made a stately bend. ‘Five and
thirty, good-looking, good figure, good teeth, good voice, good breeding,
well-dressed, dark hair, bold eyes.’ All which Mrs. Sparsit observed in
her womanly way—like the Sultan who put his head in the pail of
water—merely in dipping down and coming up again.
‘Please to be seated, sir,’ said Mrs. Sparsit.
‘Thank you. Allow me.’ He placed a chair for her, but remained himself
carelessly lounging against the table. ‘I left my servant at the railway
looking after the luggage—very heavy train and vast quantity of it in the
van—and strolled on, looking about me. Exceedingly odd place. Will you
allow me to ask you if it’s _always_ as black as this?’
‘In general much blacker,’ returned Mrs. Sparsit, in her uncompromising
way.
‘Is it possible! Excuse me: you are not a native, I think?’
‘No, sir,’ returned Mrs. Sparsit. ‘It was once my good or ill fortune,
as it may be—before I became a widow—to move in a very different sphere.
My husband was a Powler.’
‘Beg your pardon, really!’ said the stranger. ‘Was—?’
Mrs. Sparsit repeated, ‘A Powler.’
‘Powler Family,’ said the stranger, after reflecting a few moments. Mrs.
Sparsit signified assent. The stranger seemed a little more fatigued
than before.
‘You must be very much bored here?’ was the inference he drew from the
communication.
‘I am the servant of circumstances, sir,’ said Mrs. Sparsit, ‘and I have
long adapted myself to the governing power of my life.’
‘Very philosophical,’ returned the stranger, ‘and very exemplary and
laudable, and—’ It seemed to be scarcely worth his while to finish the
sentence, so he played with his watch-chain wearily.
‘May I be permitted to ask, sir,’ said Mrs. Sparsit, ‘to what I am
indebted for the favour of—’
‘Assuredly,’ said the stranger. ‘Much obliged to you for reminding me.
I am the bearer of a letter of introduction to Mr. Bounderby, the banker.
Walking through this extraordinarily black town, while they were getting
dinner ready at the hotel, I asked a fellow whom I met; one of the
working people; who appeared to have been taking a shower-bath of
something fluffy, which I assume to be the raw material—’
Mrs. Sparsit inclined her head.
‘—Raw material—where Mr. Bounderby, the banker, might reside. Upon
which, misled no doubt by the word Banker, he directed me to the Bank.
Fact being, I presume, that Mr. Bounderby the Banker does _not_ reside in
the edifice in which I have the honour of offering this explanation?’
‘No, sir,’ returned Mrs. Sparsit, ‘he does not.’
‘Thank you. I had no intention of delivering my letter at the present
moment, nor have I. But strolling on to the Bank to kill time, and having
the good fortune to observe at the window,’ towards which he languidly
waved his hand, then slightly bowed, ‘a lady of a very superior and
agreeable appearance, I considered that I could not do better than take
the liberty of asking that lady where Mr. Bounderby the Banker _does_
live. Which I accordingly venture, with all suitable apologies, to do.’
The inattention and indolence of his manner were sufficiently relieved,
to Mrs. Sparsit’s thinking, by a certain gallantry at ease, which offered