The old gentleman is eighty years old, to-day--"Eighty years old, Crofts, and never had a headache," he tells the barber who shaves him (the barber being a young fellow, and very subject to that complaint). "That"s a great age, Crofts," says the old gentleman.
"I don"t think it"s sich a wery great age, Sir," replied the barber. "Crofts," rejoins the old gentleman, "you"re talking nonsense to me. Eighty not a great age?" "It"s a wery great age, Sir, for a gentleman to be as healthy and active as you are,"
returns the barber; "but my grandfather, Sir, he was ninety-four."
"You don"t mean that, Crofts?" says the old gentleman. "I do indeed, Sir," retorts the barber, "and as wiggerous as Julius Caesar, my grandfather was." The old gentleman muses a little time, and then says, "What did he die of, Crofts?" "He died accidentally, Sir," returns the barber; "he didn"t mean to do it.
He always would go a running about the streets--walking never satisfied HIS spirit--and he run against a post and died of a hurt in his chest." The old gentleman says no more until the shaving is concluded, and then he gives Crofts half-a-crown to drink his health. He is a little doubtful of the barber"s veracity afterwards, and telling the anecdote to the old lady, affects to make very light of it--though to be sure (he adds) there was old Parr, and in some parts of England, ninety-five or so is a common age, quite a common age.
This morning the old couple are cheerful but serious, recalling old times as well as they can remember them, and dwelling upon many pa.s.sages in their past lives which the day brings to mind. The old lady reads aloud, in a tremulous voice, out of a great Bible, and the old gentleman with his hand to his ear, listens with profound respect. When the book is closed, they sit silent for a short s.p.a.ce, and afterwards resume their conversation, with a reference perhaps to their dead children, as a subject not unsuited to that they have just left. By degrees they are led to consider which of those who survive are the most like those dearly-remembered objects, and so they fall into a less solemn strain, and become cheerful again.
How many people in all, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and one or two intimate friends of the family, dine together to-day at the eldest son"s to congratulate the old couple, and wish them many happy returns, is a calculation beyond our powers; but this we know, that the old couple no sooner present themselves, very sprucely and carefully attired, than there is a violent shouting and rushing forward of the younger branches with all manner of presents, such as pocket-books, pencil-cases, pen-wipers, watch- papers, pin-cushions, sleeve-buckles, worked-slippers, watch- guards, and even a nutmeg-grater: the latter article being presented by a very chubby and very little boy, who exhibits it in great triumph as an extraordinary variety. The old couple"s emotion at these tokens of remembrance occasions quite a pathetic scene, of which the chief ingredients are a vast quant.i.ty of kissing and hugging, and repeated wipings of small eyes and noses with small square pocket-handkerchiefs, which don"t come at all easily out of small pockets. Even the peevish bachelor is moved, and he says, as he presents the old gentleman with a queer sort of antique ring from his own finger, that he"ll be de"ed if he doesn"t think he looks younger than he did ten years ago.
But the great time is after dinner, when the dessert and wine are on the table, which is pushed back to make plenty of room, and they are all gathered in a large circle round the fire, for it is then-- the gla.s.ses being filled, and everybody ready to drink the toast-- that two great-grandchildren rush out at a given signal, and presently return, dragging in old Jane Adams leaning upon her crutched stick, and trembling with age and pleasure. Who so popular as poor old Jane, nurse and story-teller in ordinary to two generations; and who so happy as she, striving to bend her stiff limbs into a curtsey, while tears of pleasure steal down her withered cheeks!
The old couple sit side by side, and the old time seems like yesterday indeed. Looking back upon the path they have travelled, its dust and ashes disappear; the flowers that withered long ago, show brightly again upon its borders, and they grow young once more in the youth of those about them.
CONCLUSION
We have taken for the subjects of the foregoing moral essays, twelve samples of married couples, carefully selected from a large stock on hand, open to the inspection of all comers. These samples are intended for the benefit of the rising generation of both s.e.xes, and, for their more easy and pleasant information, have been separately ticketed and labelled in the manner they have seen.
We have purposely excluded from consideration the couple in which the lady reigns paramount and supreme, holding such cases to be of a very unnatural kind, and like hideous births and other monstrous deformities, only to be discreetly and sparingly exhibited.
And here our self-imposed task would have ended, but that to those young ladies and gentlemen who are yet revolving singly round the church, awaiting the advent of that time when the mysterious laws of attraction shall draw them towards it in couples, we are desirous of addressing a few last words.
Before marriage and afterwards, let them learn to centre all their hopes of real and lasting happiness in their own fireside; let them cherish the faith that in home, and all the English virtues which the love of home engenders, lies the only true source of domestic felicity; let them believe that round the household G.o.ds, contentment and tranquillity cl.u.s.ter in their gentlest and most graceful forms; and that many weary hunters of happiness through the noisy world, have learnt this truth too late, and found a cheerful spirit and a quiet mind only at home at last.
How much may depend on the education of daughters and the conduct of mothers; how much of the brightest part of our old national character may be perpetuated by their wisdom or frittered away by their folly--how much of it may have been lost already, and how much more in danger of vanishing every day--are questions too weighty for discussion here, but well deserving a little serious consideration from all young couples nevertheless.
To that one young couple on whose bright destiny the thoughts of nations are fixed, may the youth of England look, and not in vain, for an example. From that one young couple, blessed and favoured as they are, may they learn that even the glare and glitter of a court, the splendour of a palace, and the pomp and glory of a throne, yield in their power of conferring happiness, to domestic worth and virtue. From that one young couple may they learn that the crown of a great empire, costly and jewelled though it be, gives place in the estimation of a Queen to the plain gold ring that links her woman"s nature to that of tens of thousands of her humble subjects, and guards in her woman"s heart one secret store of tenderness, whose proudest boast shall be that it knows no Royalty save Nature"s own, and no pride of birth but being the child of heaven!
So shall the highest young couple in the land for once hear the truth, when men throw up their caps, and cry with loving shouts -
G.o.d BLESS THEM.