Cornelius O"Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General.
by Charles Lever.
TO JOHN ANSTER, ESQ., LL.D.
My dear Anster,
If you knew how often I have thought of you as I was writing this book,--if you knew how there rose before my mind memories of long ago--of those glorious evenings with all those fine spirits, to think of whom is a triumph even with all its sadness,--and if you knew how I long to meet once more the few soldiers who survive of that "old guard,"--you would see how naturally I dedicate my volume to him who was the best of us.
Accept it, I beg you, as a token of recollection and regard from your affectionate friend,
CORNELIUS O"DOWD.
Lago Maggiore, July 20,1864.
NOTICE.
AMIABLE AND ACCOMPLISHED READER,
As I have very little to say for myself that is not said in some of my opening pages, there is no need that I should delay you on the threshold.
You will learn, if you take the trouble, by what course of events I came to my present pursuit, converting myself into what a candid, but not complimentary, friend has called "a diverting Vagabond."
The fact was, I gave the world every reasonable opportunity of knowing that they had a remarkable man amongst them, but, with a stupidity all their own, they wouldn"t see it; so that when the solicitor who once gave me a brief died--I believe it was a softening of the brain--I burned my wig and retired from the profession.
Now, let people say what they may, it is by no means easy to invent a new line of life; and even if you should, there are scores of people ready to start up and seize on your discovery; and as I write these lines I am by no means sure that to-morrow will not see some other Cornelius O"Dowd inviting the public to a feast of wisdom and life-knowledge, with perhaps a larger stock than my own of "things not generally known." I will disparage no man"s wares. There is, I feel a.s.sured, a market for us all. My rivals, or my imitators, whichever you like to call them, may prove superior to me; they maybe more ingenious, more various, more witty, or more profound; but take my word for it, bland Header, there is always something in the original tap, whether the liquor be Harvey sauce or L.L. whisky, and such is mine. You are, in coming to me, frequenting the old house; and if I could only descend to it, I could print you more testimonials to success than Mr Morrison"s of the pills, or the other man of cod-liver oil, but I scorn to give the names, imparted as they were in secret grat.i.tude. One only trick of the trade I will condescend to--it is to a.s.sure you that you had need to beware of counterfeits, and that no O"Dowderies are genuine except signed by me.
My heart is broke with requests for my autograph. Will a sympathising public accept the above--which, of course, will be immediately photographed.
CORNELIUS O"DOWD
MYSELF.
Bland Reader,--If you ever look into the Irish papers--and I hope you are not so exclusive regarding them as is Mr Cobden with the "Times"--you will see that, under the t.i.tle, "Landed Estates Court, County Mayo," Judge Dobbs has just sold the town and lands of Kilmuray-nabachlish, Ballaghy, and Gregnaslattery, the property of Cornelius O"Dowd, Esq. of Dowd"s Folly, in the same county.
Now the above-recited lands, measuring seven hundred and fourteen acres, two roods, and eleven perches, statute measure, were mine, and I am the Cornelius O"Dowd, Esq., referred to in the same paragraph.
Though it is perfectly true that, what between mortgages, settlement claims, and bonds, neither my father nor myself owned these lands any more than we did the island of Jamaica, it was a great blow to me to be sold out; for, somehow or other, one can live a long time in Ireland on parchment--I mean on the mere doc.u.ments of an estate that has long since pa.s.sed away; but if you come once to an open sale and Judge Dobbs, there"s an end of you, and you"ll not get credit for a pair of shoes the day after.
My present reason for addressing you does not require that I should go into my family history, or mention more of myself than that I was called to the Bar in "42; that I stood an unsuccessful election for Athlone; that I served as a captain in the West Coast Rifles; that I married a young lady of great personal attractions; and completed my misfortunes by taking the chairmanship of the Vichnasehneshee silver mines, that very soon left me with nothing but copper in my own pocket, and sent me to Judge Dobbs and his Court on the Inns Quay.
Like the rest of my countrymen, I was always hoping the Government would "do something" for me. I have not missed a levee for fourteen years, and I have shown the calves of my legs to every viceroyalty since Lord Clarendon"s day; but though they all joked and talked very pleasantly with me, none said, "O"Dowd, we must do something for you;" and if it was to rain commissionerships in lunacy, or prison inspectorships, I don"t believe one would fall upon C. O"D. I never knew rightly how it was, but though I was always liked at the Bar mess, and made much of on circuit, I never got a brief. People were constantly saying to me, "Con, if you were to do this, that, or t"other," you"d make a hit; but it was always conditional on my being somewhere, or doing something that I never had attempted before.
It was clear, if I was the right man, I wasn"t in the right place; and this was all the more provoking, because, let me do what I would, some one was sure to exclaim, "Con, my boy, don"t try that; it is certainly not your line." "What a capital agent for a new a.s.surance company you"d be!" "What a success you"d have had on the stage! You"d have played Sir Lucius better than any living actor. Why don"t you go on the boards? Why not start a penny newspaper? Why not give readings?" I wonder why they didn"t tell me to turn organist or a painter in oils.
"You"re always telling us how much you know of the world, Mr O"Dowd,"
said my wife; "I wish you could turn the knowledge to some account."
This was scarcely generous, to say the least of it.
Mrs O"D. knew well that I was vain of the quality--that I regarded it as a sort of specialty. In fact, deeming, with the poet, that the proper study of mankind was man, I had devoted a larger share of my life to the inquiry than quite consisted with professional advancement; and while others pored over their Blackstone, I was "doing Baden;" and instead of term reports and Crown cases, I was diverting myself in the Oberland or on the Lago Maggiore.
"And with all your great knowledge of life," continued she, "I don"t exactly see what it has done for you."
Now, Mrs O"Dowd being, as you may apprehend, a woman, I didn"t waste my time in arguing with her--I didn"t crush her, as I might, by telling her that the very highest and n.o.blest of a man"s acquirements are, _ipso facto_, the least marketable; and that the boasted excellence of all cla.s.sical education is in nothing so conspicuous as in the fact that Greek and Latin cannot be converted into money as readily as vulgar fractions and a bold handwriting. Being a woman, as I have observed, Mrs O"D. would have read the argument backwards, and stood out for the rule-of-three against Sophocles and "all his works." I simply replied, with that dignity which is natural to me, "I _am_ proud of my knowledge of life; I do recognise in myself the a.n.a.lyst of that strange mixture that makes up human chemistry; but it has never occurred to me to advertise my discovery for sale, like Holloway"s Pills or somebody"s cod-liver oil." "Perhaps you knew n.o.body would buy it," cried she, and flounced out of the room, the bang of the door being one of the "epigrams in action" wives are skilled in.
Now, with respect to my knowledge of life, I have often compared myself to those connoisseurs in art who, without a picture or an engraving of their own, can roam through a gallery, taking the most intense pleasure in all it contains, gazing with ecstasy at the Raffaeles, and lingering delighted over the sunny landscapes of Claude. To me the world has, for years, imparted a sense of much enjoyment. Human nature has been my gallery, with all its variety, its breadth, its effect, its warm colouring, and its cold tints.
It has been my pride to think that I can recognise every style and every "handling," and that no man could impose a copy upon me for an original.
"And can it be possible," cried I aloud, "that while picture-dealers revel in fortune--fellows whose traffic goes no higher than coloured canva.s.s--that I, the connoisseur of humanity, the moral toxicologist--I, who read men as I read a French comedy--that I should be obliged to deny myself the generous claret my doctor thinks essential to my system, and that repose and change of scene he deems of more consequence to me than mere physic?"
I do not--I will not--I cannot, believe it. No cla.s.s of persons could be less spared than pilots. Without their watchful skill the rich argosy that has entered the chops of the Channel would never anchor in the Pool. And are there no sand-banks, no sunk rocks, no hidden reefs, no insidious shoals, in humanity? Are there no treacherous lee-sh.o.r.es, no dangerous currents, no breakers? It is amidst these and such as these I purpose to guide my fellow-men, not pretending for a moment to the possession of any heaven-born instinct, or any inspired insight into Nature. No; I have toiled and laboured in the cause. The experience that I mean to offer for sale I have myself bought, occasionally far more dearly than I intend to dispose of it. _Haud ignarus mali_; I am willing to tell where I have been shipwrecked, and who stole my clothes. "Don"t tell me of your successes," said a great physician to his colleague, "tell me of your blunders; tell me of the people you"ve killed." I am ready to do this, figuratively of course, for they were all ladies; and more, I will make no attempt to screen myself from the ridicule that may attach to an absurd situation, nor conceal those experiences which may subject me to laughter.
You may deem me boastful if I have to set forth my qualifications; but what can I do? It is only when I have opened my pack and displayed my wares that you may feel tempted to buy. I am driven, then, to tell you that I know everybody that is worth knowing in Europe, and some two or three in America; that I have been everywhere--eaten of everything--seen everything. There"s not a railway guard from Norway to Naples doesn"t grin a recognition to me; not a waiter from the Trois Freres to the Wilde Mann doesn"t trail his napkin to earth as he sees me. Ministers speak up when I stroll into the Chamber, and _prima donnas_ soar above the orchestra, and warble in ecstasy as I enter the pit.
I don"t like--I declare to you I do not like--saying these things; it smacks of vanity. Now for my plan. I purpose to put these my gifts at your disposal The year before us will doubtless be an eventful one.
What between Danes, Poles, and Italians, there must be a row somewhere.
The French are very eager for war; and the Austrians, as Paddy says, "are blue-moulded for want of a beatin"." There will be grand "battle-pieces" to paint; but, better than these, portraits, groups, "tableaux de genre"--Teniers bits, too, at the porch of an ale-house, and warm little interiors, in the style of Mieris. I shall be instructive at times--very instructive; and whenever I am very nice and dull, be a.s.sured that I"m "full of information, and know my subject thoroughly."
As "your own correspondent," I am free to go wherever I please. I have left Mrs O"D. in Ireland, and I revel in an Arcadian liberty. These are all my credentials; and if with their aid I can furnish you any amus.e.m.e.nt as to the goings-on of the world and its wife, or the doings of that amiable couple in politics, books, theatres, or socialities, I seek for nothing more congenial to my taste, nor more adapted to my nature, as a bashful Irishman.
If I will not often obtrude, I will not altogether avoid, my personal experiences; for there is this to be said, that no testimony is worth much unless we know something of the temper, the tastes, and the character of the witness. We have all heard, for instance, of the gentleman who couldn"t laugh at Munden"s drolleries on the stage for thinking of a debt of ten pounds that the actor owed him: and this same spirit has a great deal to do--far more than we like to own--with our estimate of foreign countries. It is so hard to speak well of the climate where we had that horrible rheumatism, or laud the honesty of a people when we think of that rascally scoundrel of the Hotel d"Odessa.
For these reasons I mean to come into the witness-box occasionally, and give you frankly, not merely my opinions, but the way they were come by.
I don"t affect to be superior to prejudices; I have as many of these as a porcupine has bristles. There"s all the egotism I mean to inflict on you, unless it comes under the guise of an incident--"a circ.u.mstance which really occurred to the author"--and now, _en route_.
I wonder am I right in thinking that the present race of travelling English know less about the Continent and foreigners generally than their predecessors of, say, five-and-twenty years ago. Railroads and rapid travelling might be one cause; another is, that English is now more generally spoken by all foreigners than formerly; and it may be taken as a maxim, that nothing was ever asked or answered in broken phraseology that was worth the hearing. People with a limited knowledge of a strange language do not say what they _wish_, but what they _can_; and there is no name for the helplessness of him who is tied up in his preter-pluperfect tense. Now we English are not linguists; even our diplomatists are remarkable for their little proficiency in French.
I"m not sure that we don"t benefit by this in the long-run. "Reden ist silber, aber Schweigen ist gold"--"Speech is silver, but silence is gold," says the German adage; and what a deal of wisdom have I seen attributed to a man who was posed by his declensions into a listener!
One of the only countrymen of my own who has made a great career lately in public life is not a little indebted to deafness for it. He was so unlike those rash, impetuous, impatient Irish, who _would_ interrupt--he listened, or seemed to listen, and he even smiled at the sarcasms that he did not hear.
Listening, if we did but know it, sits more gracefully on us than speech, when that speech involves the denial of genders, and the utter confusion of all cases and tenses.
Next to holding their tongues, there"s another thing I wish you English would do abroad, which is, to dress like sane and responsible people.
Men are simply absurd; but the women, with their ill-behaved hoops and short petticoats, are positively indecent; but the greatest of all their travelling offences is the p.r.o.neness to form acquaintance at _tables-d"hote_.
It is, first of all, a rank indiscretion for any but men to dine at these places. They are almost, as a rule, the resort of all that is disreputable in both s.e.xes. You are sure to eat badly, and in the very worst of company. My warning is, however, meant for my countrywomen only: men can, or at least ought, to take care of themselves. As for myself, don"t be shocked; but I do like doubtful company--that is, I am immensely interested by all that cla.s.s of people which the world calls adventurers, whether the same be railroad speculators, fortune-hunters, discoverers of inexhaustible mines, or Garibaldians. Your respectable man, with a pocket-book well stored with his circular notes, and his pa.s.sport in order, is as uninteresting as a "Treckshuyt" on a Dutch ca.n.a.l; but your "martyr to circ.u.mstance" is like a smart felucca in a strong Levanter; and you can watch his course--how he shakes out his reefs or shortens sail--how he flaunts out his bunting, or hides his colours--with an unflagging interest I have often thought what a deal of cleverness--what stores of practical ability--were lost to the world in these out-at-elbow fellows, who speak every language fluently, play every game well, sing pleasingly, dance, ride, row, and shoot, especially with the pistol, to perfection. There they are, with a ma.s.s of qualities that win success! and, what often is harder, win goodwill in life! There they are, by some unhappy twist in their natures, preferring the precarious existence of the race-course or the billiard-table; while others, with about a t.i.the of their talents, are high in place and power. I met one of these men to-day, and a strong specimen of the cla.s.s, well dressed, well whiskered, very quiet in manner, almost subdued in tone, but with a slight restlessness in his eye that was very significant. We found ourselves at table, over our coffee, when the others had left, and fell into conversation. He declined my offered cigar with much courtesy, preferring to smoke little cigarettes of his own making; and really the manufacture was very adroit, and, in its way, a study of the maker"s habits. We talked over the usual topics--the bad dinner we had just eaten, the strange-looking company, the discomfort of the hotel generally, and suchlike.
"Have we not met before?" asked he, after a pause. "If I don"t mistake, we dined together aboard of Leslie"s yacht, the Fawn."
I shook my head. "Only knew Sir Francis Leslie by name; never saw the Fawn."
The shot failed, but there was no recoil in his gun, and he merely bowed a half apology.