Section 43 of 56 - Table of Contents
THE CONFESSIONS OF HARRY LORREQUER, v6
[By Charles James Lever (1806-1872)]
Dublin
MDCCCXXXIX.
Volume 6. (Chapter XLII-LV)
Contents:
CHAPTER XLII.
The Journey
CHAPTER XLIII.
The Journey
CHAPTER XLIV.
A Reminscence of the East
CHAPTER XLV.
A Day in the Phoenix
CHAPTER XLVI.
An Adventure in Canada
CHAPTER XLVII.
The Courier's Passport
CHAPTER XLVIII.
A Night in Strasbourg
CHAPTER XLIX.
A Surprise
CHAPTER L.
Jack Waller's Story
CHAPTER LI.
Munich
CHAPTER LII.
Inn at Munich
CHAPTER LIII.
The Ball
CHAPTER LIV.
A Discovery
CHAPTER LV.
Conclusion
CHAPTER XLII.
THE JOURNEY.
Trevanion came at last. He had obtained my passport, and engaged a
carriage to convey me about eight miles, where I should overtake the
diligence--such a mode of travelling being judged more likely to favour
my escape, by attracting less attention than posting. It was past ten
when I left the Rue St. Honore, having shaken hands with Trevanion for
the last time, and charged him with ten thousand soft messages for the
"friends" I left behind me.
When I arrived at the village of St. Jacques, the diligence had not come
up. To pass away the time, I ordered a little supper and a bottle of St.
Julien. Scarcely had I seated myself to my "cotelette," when the rapid
whirl of wheels was heard without, and a cab drew up suddenly at the
door. So naturally does the fugitive suspect pursuit, that my immediate
impression was, that I was followed. In this notion I was strengthened
by the tones of a cracked, discordant voice, asking in very peculiar
French if the "diligence had passed?" Being answered in the negative he
walked into the room where I was, and speedily by his appearance, removed
any apprehensions I had felt as to my safety. Nothing could less
resemble the tall port and sturdy bearing of a gendarme, than the
diminutive and dwarfish individual before me. His height could scarcely
have reached five feet, of which the head formed fully a fourth part; and
even this was rendered in appearance still greater by a mass of loosely
floating black hair that fell upon his neck and shoulders, and gave him
much the air of a "black lion" on a sign board. His black frock,
fur-collared and braided--his ill-made boots, his meerschaum projecting
from his breast-pocket, above all, his unwashed hands, and a heavy gold
ring upon his thumb--all made up an ensemble of evidences that showed he
could be nothing but a German. His manner was bustling, impatient, and
had it not been ludicrous, would certainly be considered as insolent to
every one about him, for he stared each person abruptly in the face, and
mumbled some broken expressions of his opinion of them half-aloud in
German. His comments ran on:--"Bon soir, Monsieur," to the host: "Ein
boesewicht, ganz sicher"--"a scoundrel without doubt;" and then added,
still lower, "Rob you here as soon as look at you." "Ah, postillion!
comment va?"--"much more like a brigand after all--I know which I'd take
you for." "Ver fluchte fraw"--"how ugly the woman is." This compliment
was intended for the hostess, who curtsied down to the ground in her
ignorance. At last approaching me, he stopped, and having steadily
surveyed me, muttered, "Ein echter Englander"--"a thorough Englishman,
always eating." I could not resist the temptation to assure him that I
was perfectly aware of his flattering impression in my behalf, though I
had speedily to regret my precipitancy, for, less mindful of the rebuke
than pleased at finding some one who understood German, he drew his chair
beside me and entered into conversation.
Every one has surely felt, some time or other in life, the insufferable
annoyance of having his thoughts and reflections interfered with, and
broken in upon by the vulgar impertinence and egotism of some "bore,"
who, mistaking your abstraction for attention and your despair for
delight, inflicts upon you his whole life and adventures, when your own
immediate destinies are perhaps vacillating in the scale.
Such a doom was now mine! Occupied as I was by the hope of the future,
and my fears lest any impediment to my escape should blast my prospects
for ever, I preferred appearing to pay attention to this confounded
fellow's "personal narrative" lest his questions, turning on my own
affairs, might excite suspicions as to the reasons of my journey.
I longed most ardently for the arrival of the diligence, trusting that
with true German thrift, by friend might prefer the cheapness of the
"interieure" to the magnificence of the "coupe," and that thus I should
see no more of him. But in this pleasing hope I was destined to be
disappointed, for I was scarcely seated in my place when I found him
beside me. The third occupant of this "privileged den," as well as my
lamp-light survey of him permitted, afforded nothing to build on as a
compensation for the German. He was a tall, lanky, lantern-jawed man,
with a hook nose and projecting chin; his hair, which had only been
permitted to grow very lately, formed that curve upon his forehead we
see in certain old fashioned horse-shoe wigs; his compressed lip and
hard features gave the expression of one who had seen a good deal of the
world, and didn't think the better of it in consequence. I observed that
he listened to the few words we spoke while getting in with some
attention, and then, like a person who did not comprehend the language,
turned his shoulder towards us, and soon fell asleep. I was now left to
the "tender mercies" of my talkative companion, who certainly spared me
not. Notwithstanding my vigorous resolves to turn a deaf ear to his
narratives, I could not avoid learning that he was the director of music
to some German prince--that he had been to Paris to bring out an opera
which having, as he said, a "success pyramidal," he was about to repeat in
Strasbourg. He further informed me that a depute from Alsace had
obtained for him a government permission to travel with the courier; but
that he being "social" withal, and no ways proud, preferred the democracy
of the diligence to the solitary grandeur of the caleche, (for which
heaven confound him,) and thus became my present companion.
Music, in all its shapes and forms made up the staple of the little
man's talk. There was scarcely an opera or an overture, from Mozart to
Donizetti, that he did not insist upon singing a scene from; and wound up
all by a very pathetic lamentation over English insensibility to music,
which he in great part attributed to our having only one opera, which he
kindly informed me was "Bob et Joan." However indisposed to check the
current of his loquacity by any effort of mine, I could not avoid the
temptation to translate for him a story which Sir Walter Scott once
related to me, and was so far apropos, as conveying my own sense of the
merits of our national music, such as we have it, by its association with
scenes, and persons, and places we are all familiar with, however
unintelligible to the ear of a stranger.
A young French viscomte was fortunate enough to obtain in marriage the
hand of a singularly pretty Scotch heiress of an old family and good
fortune, who, amongst her other endowments, possessed a large
old-fashioned house in a remote district of the highlands, where her
ancestors had resided for centuries. Thither the young couple repaired
to pass their honeymoon; the enamoured bridegroom gladly availing himself
of the opportunity to ingratiate himself with his new connexion, by
adopting the seclusion he saw practised by the English on such occasions.
However consonant to our notions of happiness, and however conducive to
our enjoyment this custom be--and I have strong doubts upon the subject
--it certainly prospered ill with the volatile Frenchman, who pined for
Paris, its cafes, its boulevards, its maisons de jeu, and its soirees.
His days were passed in looking from the deep and narrow windows of some
oak-framed room upon the bare and heath-clad moors, or watching the
cloud's shadows as they passed across the dark pine trees that closed the
distance.
Ennuyee to death, and convinced that he had sacrificed enough and more
than enough to the barbarism which demanded such a "sejour," he was
sitting one evening listlessly upon the terrace in front of the house,
plotting a speedy escape from his gloomy abode, and meditating upon the
life of pleasure that awaited him, when the discordant twang of some
savage music broke upon his ear, and roused him from his reverie. The
wild scream and fitful burst of a highland pibroch is certainly not the
most likely thing in nature to allay the irritable and ruffled feelings
of an irascible person--unless, perhaps, the hearer eschew breeches. So
thought the viscomte. He started hurriedly up, and straight before him,
upon the gravel-walk, beheld the stalwart figure and bony frame of an old
highlander, blowing, with all his lungs, the "Gathering of the clans."
With all the speed he could muster, he rushed into the house, and,
calling his servants, ordered them to expel the intruder, and drive him
at once outside the demesne. When the mandate was made known to the old
piper, it was with the greatest difficulty he could be brought to
comprehend it--for, time out of mind, his approach had been hailed
with every demonstration of rejoicing; and now--but no; the thing was
impossible--there must be a mistake somewhere. He was accordingly about
to recommence, when a second and stronger hint suggested to him that it
were safer to depart. "Maybe the 'carl' did na like the pipes," said the
highlander musingly, as he packed them up for his march. "Maybe he did
na like me;" "perhaps, too, he was na in the humour of music." He paused
for an instant as if reflecting--not satisfied, probably, that he had hit
upon the true solution--when suddenly his eye brightened, his lips
curled, and fixing a look upon the angry Frenchman, he said--"Maybe ye
are right enow--ye heard them ower muckle in Waterloo to like the skirl
o' them ever since;" with which satisfactory explanation, made in no
spirit of bitterness or raillery, but in the simple belief that he had
at last hit the mark of the viscomte's antipathy, the old man gathered
up his plaid and departed.
However disposed I might have felt towards sleep, the little German
resolved I should not obtain any, for when for half an hour together I
would preserve a rigid silence, he, nowise daunted, had recourse to some
German "lied," which he gave forth with an energy of voice and manner
that must have aroused every sleeper in the diligence: so that, fain to
avoid this, I did my best to keep him on the subject of his adventures,
which, as a man of successful gallantry, were manifold indeed. Wearying
at last, even of this subordinate part, I fell into a kind of half doze.
The words of a student song he continued to sing without ceasing for
above an hour--being the last waking thought on my memory.
Less as a souvenir of the singer than a specimen of its class I give here
a rough translation of the well-known Burschen melody called
THE POPE
I.
The Pope, he leads a happy life,
He fears not married care, nor strife,
He drinks the best of Rhenish wine,
I would the Pope's gay lot were mine.
CHORUS.
He drinks the best of Rhenish wine.
I would the Pope's gay lot were mine.
II.
But then all happy's not his life,
He has not maid, nor blooming wife;
Nor child has he to raise his hope--
I would not wish to be the Pope.
III.
The Sultan better pleases me,
His is a life of jollity;
His wives are many as he will--
I would the Sultan's throne then fill.
IV.
But even he's a wretched man,
He must obey his Alcoran;
And dares not drink one drop of wine--
I would not change his lot for mine.
V.
So then I'll hold my lowly stand,
And live in German Vaterland;
I'll kiss my maiden fair and fine,
And drink the best of Rhenish wine.
VI.
Whene'er my maiden kisses me,
I'll think that I the Sultan be;
And when my cheery glass I tope,
I'll fancy then I am the Pope.
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