The Pickwick Papers
retirement, and offered Mr. Pickwick a pinch of snuff with the air of a
man who had made up his mind to a Christian forgiveness of injuries
sustained. The old lady’s hearing decidedly improved and the unlucky
Miller felt as much out of his element as a dolphin in a sentry-box.
Meanwhile the round game proceeded right merrily. Isabella Wardle and
Mr. Trundle ‘went partners,’ and Emily Wardle and Mr. Snodgrass did the
same; and even Mr. Tupman and the spinster aunt established a joint-
stock company of fish and flattery. Old Mr. Wardle was in the very
height of his jollity; and he was so funny in his management of the
board, and the old ladies were so sharp after their winnings, that the
whole table was in a perpetual roar of merriment and laughter. There was
one old lady who always had about half a dozen cards to pay for, at
which everybody laughed, regularly every round; and when the old lady
looked cross at having to pay, they laughed louder than ever; on which
the old lady’s face gradually brightened up, till at last she laughed
louder than any of them, Then, when the spinster aunt got ‘matrimony,’
the young ladies laughed afresh, and the Spinster aunt seemed disposed
to be pettish; till, feeling Mr. Tupman squeezing her hand under the
table, she brightened up too, and looked rather knowing, as if matrimony
in reality were not quite so far off as some people thought for;
whereupon everybody laughed again, and especially old Mr. Wardle, who
enjoyed a joke as much as the youngest. As to Mr. Snodgrass, he did
nothing but whisper poetical sentiments into his partner’s ear, which
made one old gentleman facetiously sly, about partnerships at cards and
partnerships for life, and caused the aforesaid old gentleman to make
some remarks thereupon, accompanied with divers winks and chuckles,
which made the company very merry and the old gentleman’s wife
especially so. And Mr. Winkle came out with jokes which are very well
known in town, but are not all known in the country; and as everybody
laughed at them very heartily, and said they were very capital, Mr.
Winkle was in a state of great honour and glory. And the benevolent
clergyman looked pleasantly on; for the happy faces which surrounded the
table made the good old man feel happy too; and though the merriment was
rather boisterous, still it came from the heart and not from the lips;
and this is the right sort of merriment, after all.
The evening glided swiftly away, in these cheerful recreations; and when
the substantial though homely supper had been despatched, and the little
party formed a social circle round the fire, Mr. Pickwick thought he had
never felt so happy in his life, and at no time so much disposed to
enjoy, and make the most of, the passing moment.
‘Now this,’ said the hospitable host, who was sitting in great state
next the old lady’s arm-chair, with her hand fast clasped in his--‘this
is just what I like--the happiest moments of my life have been passed at
this old fireside; and I am so attached to it, that I keep up a blazing
fire here every evening, until it actually grows too hot to bear it.
Why, my poor old mother, here, used to sit before this fireplace upon
that little stool when she was a girl; didn’t you, mother?’
The tear which starts unbidden to the eye when the recollection of old
times and the happiness of many years ago is suddenly recalled, stole
down the old lady’s face as she shook her head with a melancholy smile.
‘You must excuse my talking about this old place, Mr. Pickwick,’ resumed
the host, after a short pause, ‘for I love it dearly, and know no other-
-the old houses and fields seem like living friends to me; and so does
our little church with the ivy, about which, by the bye, our excellent
friend there made a song when he first came amongst us. Mr. Snodgrass,
have you anything in your glass?’
‘Plenty, thank you,’ replied that gentleman, whose poetic curiosity had
been greatly excited by the last observation of his entertainer. ‘I beg
your pardon, but you were talking about the song of the Ivy.’
‘You must ask our friend opposite about that,’ said the host knowingly,
indicating the clergyman by a nod of his head.
‘May I say that I should like to hear you repeat it, sir?’ said Mr.
Snodgrass.
‘Why, really,’ replied the clergyman, ‘it’s a very slight affair; and
the only excuse I have for having ever perpetrated it is, that I was a
young man at the time. Such as it is, however, you shall hear it, if you
wish.’
A murmur of curiosity was of course the reply; and the old gentleman
proceeded to recite, with the aid of sundry promptings from his wife,
the lines in question. ‘I call them,’ said he,
THE IVY GREEN
Oh, a dainty plant is the Ivy green, That creepeth o’er ruins old! Of
right choice food are his meals, I ween, In his cell so lone and cold.
The wall must be crumbled, the stone decayed, To pleasure his dainty
whim; And the mouldering dust that years have made, Is a merry meal for
him. Creeping where no life is seen, A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Fast he stealeth on, though he wears no wings, And a staunch old heart
has he. How closely he twineth, how tight he clings To his friend the
huge Oak Tree! And slily he traileth along the ground, And his leaves he
gently waves, As he joyously hugs and crawleth round The rich mould of
dead men’s graves. Creeping where grim death has been, A rare old plant
is the Ivy green.
Whole ages have fled and their works decayed, And nations have scattered
been; But the stout old Ivy shall never fade, From its hale and hearty
green. The brave old plant in its lonely days, Shall fatten upon the
past; For the stateliest building man can raise, Is the Ivy’s food at
last. Creeping on where time has been, A rare old plant is the Ivy
green.
While the old gentleman repeated these lines a second time, to enable
Mr. Snodgrass to note them down, Mr. Pickwick perused the lineaments of
his face with an expression of great interest. The old gentleman having
concluded his dictation, and Mr. Snodgrass having returned his note-book
to his pocket, Mr. Pickwick said--
‘Excuse me, sir, for making the remark on so short an acquaintance; but
a gentleman like yourself cannot fail, I should think, to have observed
many scenes and incidents worth recording, in the course of your
experience as a minister of the Gospel.’
‘I have witnessed some certainly,’ replied the old gentleman, ‘but the
incidents and characters have been of a homely and ordinary nature, my
sphere of action being so very limited.’
‘You did make some notes, I think, about John Edmunds, did you not?’
inquired Mr. Wardle, who appeared very desirous to draw his friend out,
for the edification of his new visitors.
The old gentleman slightly nodded his head in token of assent, and was
proceeding to change the subject, when Mr. Pickwick said--
‘I beg your pardon, sir, but pray, if I may venture to inquire, who was
John Edmunds?’
‘The very thing I was about to ask,’ said Mr. Snodgrass eagerly.
‘You are fairly in for it,’ said the jolly host. ‘You must satisfy the
curiosity of these gentlemen, sooner or later; so you had better take
advantage of this favourable opportunity, and do so at once.’
The old gentleman smiled good-humouredly as he drew his chair forward--
the remainder of the party drew their chairs closer together, especially
Mr. Tupman and the spinster aunt, who were possibly rather hard of
hearing; and the old lady’s ear-trumpet having been duly adjusted, and
Mr. Miller (who had fallen asleep during the recital of the verses)
roused from his slumbers by an admonitory pinch, administered beneath
the table by his ex-partner the solemn fat man, the old gentleman,
without further preface, commenced the following tale, to which we have
taken the liberty of prefixing the title of
THE CONVICT’S RETURN
‘When I first settled in this village,’ said the old gentleman, ‘which
is now just five-and-twenty years ago, the most notorious person among
my parishioners was a man of the name of Edmunds, who leased a small
farm near this spot. He was a morose, savage-hearted, bad man; idle and
dissolute in his habits; cruel and ferocious in his disposition. Beyond
the few lazy and reckless vagabonds with whom he sauntered away his time
in the fields, or sotted in the ale-house, he had not a single friend or
acquaintance; no one cared to speak to the man whom many feared, and
every one detested--and Edmunds was shunned by all.
‘This man had a wife and one son, who, when I first came here, was about
twelve years old. Of the acuteness of that woman’s sufferings, of the
gentle and enduring manner in which she bore them, of the agony of
solicitude with which she reared that boy, no one can form an adequate
conception. Heaven forgive me the supposition, if it be an uncharitable
one, but I do firmly and in my soul believe, that the man systematically
tried for many years to break her heart; but she bore it all for her
child’s sake, and, however strange it may seem to many, for his father’s
too; for brute as he was, and cruelly as he had treated her, she had
loved him once; and the recollection of what he had been to her,
awakened feelings of forbearance and meekness under suffering in her
bosom, to which all God’s creatures, but women, are strangers.
‘They were poor--they could not be otherwise when the man pursued such
courses; but the woman’s unceasing and unwearied exertions, early and
late, morning, noon, and night, kept them above actual want. These
exertions were but ill repaid. People who passed the spot in the
evening--sometimes at a late hour of the night--reported that they had
heard the moans and sobs of a woman in distress, and the sound of blows;
and more than once, when it was past midnight, the boy knocked softly at
the door of a neighbour’s house, whither he had been sent, to escape the
drunken fury of his unnatural father.
‘During the whole of this time, and when the poor creature often bore
about her marks of ill-usage and violence which she could not wholly
conceal, she was a constant attendant at our little church. Regularly
every Sunday, morning and afternoon, she occupied the same seat with the
boy at her side; and though they were both poorly dressed--much more so
than many of their neighbours who were in a lower station--they were
always neat and clean. Every one had a friendly nod and a kind word for
“poor Mrs. Edmunds”; and sometimes, when she stopped to exchange a few
words with a neighbour at the conclusion of the service in the little
row of elm-trees which leads to the church porch, or lingered behind to
gaze with a mother’s pride and fondness upon her healthy boy, as he
sported before her with some little companions, her careworn face would
lighten up with an expression of heartfelt gratitude; and she would
look, if not cheerful and happy, at least tranquil and contented.
‘Five or six years passed away; the boy had become a robust and well-
grown youth. The time that had strengthened the child’s slight frame and
knit his weak limbs into the strength of manhood had bowed his mother’s
form, and enfeebled her steps; but the arm that should have supported
her was no longer locked in hers; the face that should have cheered her,
no more looked upon her own. She occupied her old seat, but there was a
vacant one beside her. The Bible was kept as carefully as ever, the
places were found and folded down as they used to be: but there was no
one to read it with her; and the tears fell thick and fast upon the
book, and blotted the words from her eyes. Neighbours were as kind as
they were wont to be of old, but she shunned their greetings with
averted head. There was no lingering among the old elm-trees now--no
cheering anticipations of happiness yet in store. The desolate woman