by R S Surtees
From Prospect Hill a clear programme of our pic-nic party may now be obtained, the foremost carriages which dot the chalky road over the distant down —
“Show scarce so gross as beetles,”
while the whole line backward is studded with enlarging vehicles enlivened with gay parasols, pink, blue, white, lilac, lavender — all the smart colours of the season. And much the fair bearers need them, for the sun is scorchingly hot, and the air, even in these exalted regions, dances before the dazzled eyes. At length the foremost vehicles gain the brow of North Bendlaw Hill, from which the Union Jack of the Priory is seen, and a slight incline of the road quickly varies the landscape and brings the traveller amid the enclosures and green trees of the vale. Carriage after carriage drives quickly down, and great is the run upon Mrs. Baccoman’s looking-glass, each fair lady thinking the other is keeping it a most unconscionable time, while the anxious faces of the waiters contrast with the self-satisfied ones of the goers away.
CHAPTER VII.
THE GIPSY’S PROPHECY.
PEOPLE AT A pic-nic seldom amalgamate well until after dinner. There is generally caution and mistrust until confidence is promoted by a few glasses of wine. Thus it was on the present occasion. The guests kept to their respective coteries, seemingly more intent upon asking, “Who was who,” than desirous of making “Who’s” acquaintance. So, as each looming lady emerged from her shake out, she made up to the matron who had charge of her movements. They then trooped off on their respective trips, some down the lovers’-walk, some up to the haunted glen, others to the dropping well at Dewhurst. Most of them had seen the Priory with its crypt and octagonal pillars, its famous old windows and winding staircase, while the now canvas-roofed refectory was to be the dining-room on the present occasion. Very little sight-seeing serves parties at a pic-nic. Though so light and airy, they are generally bent on the more serious business of life.
Our fair heroine, though she had the graceful feminine art of accommodating her likings to her company, preferred a stroll among the large trees to a squeeze up the narrow stone staircase, or a dive down below; a choice that was highly approved of by Mamma as better both for her daughter’s complexion, as for preserving the freshness of her piquant little black hat set off with a light blue feather, and the glorious amplitude of her white muslin dress, enriched with ribbons to match the feather. We often think it fortunate for the Hottentot Venus that she lived when she did, for she would never have made anything by showing herself now-a-days. Well, our fair friend and Mamma having evaded Mrs. Trattles as she went to greet some fresh arrivera, proceeded to perambulate together, Mamma relying upon the never-failing attraction of beauty for procuring her daughter partners at the proper time. So they lionised themselves, peeping up this walk and down that, more intent upon killing time than adding to their stock of topographical knowledge. As they sauntered along in the cool shade formed by the over-hanging branches of the limes, a something rustled on the left, and presently the swarthy red-shawled gipsy stood with distended arms before them. Mamma and daughter uttered a faint shriek and started back.
“Nay, don’t be frightened!” exclaimed the gipsy, soothingly —
“don’t be frightened! Bless your beautiful face, my lovely young lady!” continued she, addressing our heroine. “If ever there was a babe born to rank and riches it is your own sweet iligant self.”
“Stuff and nonsense,” muttered Mrs. McDermott— “stuff and nonsense,” motioning her aside with her blue parasol.
“Nay, don’t say that,” replied the gipsy, softly—” don’t say that, my lady. I’ve ruled the planets these twenty years, and never yet told wrong; cross my palm with a bit of silver, my dear lady mam, and I’ll tell you who you’ll marry — step aside here, step aside,” continued she, motioning them off the walk.
“No, my good woman,” replied Mrs. McDermott, pursuing her course; “we don’t believe in any such nonsense; but see, there’s a shilling for you,” producing one from her purse as she spoke, “and now let us hear what you have to say.”
The gipsy pocketed the money, and scrutinised our young friend with her piercing black eyes.
“You’ve not yet seen the man you’ll marry,” said she, slowly and deliberately.
“Indeed!” blushed Rosa, thinking of our friend in the country.
“But you’ll see him to-day,” added the gipsy, archly.
“And what will he be like?” asked Mrs. McDermott.
“Like!” exclaimed the gipsy. “He’ll be the handsomest man here — tall, with raven hair, and eagle eyes, and money beyond measure.”
“Indeed!” laughed Mrs. McDermott, and just at that moment some more migratory balloons appearing in the distance, the gipsy rushed off to invest them with husbands also — assigning dark to the fair, fair to the dark, tall to the short, and so on. And Miss and Mamma sauntered back to the Priory, inwardly wondering what would come of their own particular prophecy.
CHAPTER VIII.
ADMIRATION JACK.
THE USUAL ORDER of a pic-nic march is, the promoters with their nearly caught conquests first, the half caught couples second, the mere nibblers third, and then, what the racing reporters call the “ruck.” The wholly disinterested, disengaged, yawny young gentlemen, never come till late; indeed never exactly know whether they are coming or not until they get there, and when there, are never sure they are going to stay. A pic-nic, being an indefinite sort of entertainment, comprises every variety of male costume — morning coats, evening coats, nondescript coats, riding boots, dress boots, jockey whips, and heel spurs. The ladies only vary their costume by laying aside their bonnets for dinner or the dance, though if they were to take our advice they would keep them on — especially if the bonnets are pretty ones.
There had been a great setting down of company during the time of Mrs and Miss McDermott’s walk, and several equally entire strangers as themselves having come, there was less staring, and less use of the eye-glass than before. What a summary of severity can be expressed in the cynical curl of the nose at the quizzing-glass. Fancy a young fellow who has just married an old woman for her — the reader knows what — undergoing the scornful scrutiny of some fifty or sixty dowagers, as he sneaks with his piece of antiquity up a ball-room. That, however, is the settled severity of a row of wall-flowers which the ever-varying grouping of a pic-nic affords no accommodation for. When our fair Mends returned from their walk, the bustle of arrangement was in full operation, and Mrs. Trattles and Mrs. Bolsterworth, Mrs. Heeviman, and Miss Whistlecraft, all the matchmaking fussing ones, were running about, asking for this gentleman or for that, endeavouring to joint their parties preparatory to dinner. Seeing our fair friends approach, Mrs. Trattles ran to reclaim them — chided their truancy, and in the same breath proposed to introduce a “most particular Mend of hers, a young gentleman of large fortune — fifteen thousand four hundred a-year, landed property, with a castle — extremely handsome,” and before Mrs. McDermott could edge in a word, a tallish, dark-haired, dark-eyed gentleman — much the sort of the man described by the gipsy — splendidly got up, and generous in jewelry, was bowing respectfully under the name of Mr. Bunting. Having clenched that introduction, Mrs. Trattles quickly hurried off to suit some other parties in a similar way, leaving Mr. Bunting to ingratiate himself in the usual way — smiling, sidling, ogleing, simpering, nothinging in fact — a stile of proceeding that our newly-introduced friend was quite au fait at. Mr. Bunting or Admiration Jock, as he was commonly called, from his extreme satisfaction with himself, though he had the reputation of an immense fortune, had in reality nothing of the sort, having been ruined in rather a singular way — namely, by his grandfather buying a book. We have heard of people being ruined in curious ways — some by getting fortunes left them — others by not getting fortunes left them, some by marrying heiresses, others by not marrying heiresses, some by marrying rich widows, others by not marrying rich widows; but we never before heard of a man being ruined by buying a book. Y
et so it was in the present instance. Jack was the grandson of that jolly old nautical Bear-Admiral Bunting, so well known at the various ports where good fellows congregate, and the Bear-Admiral being once stranded at Portsmouth, had had the misfortune to buy a book — the only one, we should think, in the place — namely, “Daftun on Planting,” which completely turned the head of the tar. Being a great man for the wooden walls of old England, he was highly delighted with it, not only because it showed how to maintain the supremacy of his favourite service, but also how a pure patriot like himself might enrich his family by benefiting his country. This was by planting oak, and “Daftun” showed as clearly, as figures always show everything, that an immense fortune must inevitably be reaped by the noble national undertaking. Indeed the principles upon which the calculations proceeded were so simple as almost to defy contradiction, and may be briefly stated as founded on the supposition that an oak-tree at seventy-five years of age must contain forty-five feet of timber, which must be worth £8 a-tree. Then, without troubling ourselves with intermediate thinnings which, however, “Daftun” showed would be highly remunerative, there were to be 302 trees per acre, at the end of seventy-five years, which at £8 per tree, would be worth £2416 per acre. Add as many acres together as would satisfy ambition, and there would be the money to the day, far better than buying farms, or investing money in the funds, or in any other species of fluctuating property.
The idea struck the Bear-Admiral amazingly, and he determined to carry it out to the utmost of his ability. Accordingly he bought a bleak hill side in Renfrewshire, five hundred acres of which he magnanimously appropriated to growing navy-timber, and he saw his way to one million three hundred and sixty-five thousand five hundred pounds! as plainly as if he had it in his pocket. “Bliss us, what a fortin!” the old boy used to exclaim, as far away at sea he lay tossing about in his cabin. “Bliss us, what a fortin! one million three ‘underd and sixty-five thousand five ‘underd punds, all for an outlay of three-and-twenty ‘underd.” And he hugged “Daftun” to his heart and blessed him, for showing him the way to such wealth, and he occasionally saw in the dim mist of the future a peerage for the owner of the aerial edifice of Buntingbury Castle. So having planned and planted, and done everything in a most business-like way, upon paper, he sailed upon the world with the confidence of a man who has invested a sum of money in the funds, and given his broker a power of attorney to add the accruing dividends to the capital.
Tears rolled on, and the Admiral and the Admiral’s son having both paid the debt of nature, now when our hero No. 2 ought to be in possession of unbounded wealth, his resources from his forest may be best described by extracting an item from Messrs. Chalker and Charger of Lothbury’s bill, who had been sent down express to look a little into matters, in consequence of a proposal our friend had made the beautiful daughter of a rich client of theirs. The following is the item: —
“Chaise-hire and expenses from C — b to Buntingbury Castle, where instead of a fine forest we found nothing but stunted stagheaded trees, and a four-roomed shooting-box of a house — £2. 3s. 4d.”
Still there was the estate, and there was the house, and, as the Judges lay it down every assizes, that “a man’s house is his castle,” surely our friend had a right to call his shooting-box a castle, if he liked. Why, we remember a sheepfold on the Wiltshire Downs that used to be called something Castle. We went there one morning to hunt, expecting to get a good breakfast, and found nothing but an old shepherd stretched upon a grassy mound. “This be castle,” said he, in reply to our inquiry, and sure enough, in a few minutes up came Squire Twentystun’s fox-hounds and deployed over the place. Out upon the objection, say we! It’s not a liberal way of looking at the matter.
Thus, then, stood our friend Mr. Bunting. B[e was young, gay, and good-looking; with a great taste for beauty, and abundant leisure for falling into love. Indeed, he did little but dress, sigh, and write limping lines; and though he had often had a certain document beginning with “Proposals for a settlement to be made on the intended marriage of John Bunting, Esq., with Miss so and so,” returned on his hands, sometimes with a stiffish lawyer’s bill, sometimes without; he yet retained the reputation of great castellated wealth, and indeed half believed that the much decried oaks would still come round, and be a goodly heritage at last. “Daftun” said so, and surely “Daftun” knew better than the lawyers. They only wanted a little more age perhaps, and when they once took to growing, would soon make up their lee way. So our friend hoped against hope, keeping “Daftun’s” calculations afloat; and though he would have had no objections to an heiress, if it was only to get the wherewithal to build the castle with, yet, he did not go altogether for money, but made beauty his first consideration, and had now run the gauntlet of many fair maids, including a brunette or two, from whose successive negations, he always felt morally certain he could never recover; yet somehow or other, after the lapse of a certain time, ho always found himself in just the same predicament with some other young lady. His last flame was pretty Miss Wingfield of somewhere in Cumberland, whose father had let him down somewhat unceremoniously, returning his writings with a lawyer’s bill made out in a rather vindictive acrimonious way; for instead of running all the six-and-eightpences, thirteen-and-fourpences, and one pound ones, on in regular succession, carrying the amount of each page over on to the next, Biter and Co., of Whitehaven, added each page up separately, making what they called a “grand recapitulation” of the whole at the end. So when our hero got the plump packet (stamped with a green stamp), and turned with hurried hand and eager eye to the bottom of the last page, he perked up considerably on finding 13l. 17s. 2d., figuring as the amount, and chucked the whole thing over on to the side-table for future consideration. But a few days after, having stuck fast in a sonnet he was weaving to his various lady-loves, he turned for inspiration to something solid; when half way down an unnumbered page, he discovered the dread reality, and the bill instead of being 13l. 17s. 2d., was in fact 43l. 13s. 4d., the 13l. 17s. 2d., being only the amount of the last page. So what with a twenty-guinea diamond ring that the young lady had forgotten to return him along with his letters and poetical effusions, together with seven pound odd he had spent in equestrian exercise, in the Howes and Cushing line, he had got a long way into a three-figure note. Admiration Jack, however, was a man of good cheer, not easily depressed, on capital terms with himself, and just as ready to enter the lists as if he had never been foiled; and no sooner saw our fair friend circling among the crowd, than declaring that there were as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it, he resolved to make up to her. And Rosa having recovered from the surprise and trepidation caused by the speedy fulfilment of the prophecy (which making allowance for the exaggeration of a gipsy, was not such a bad one), turned a smiling face and ready ear to our philanderer, as if there was no such person as Jasper Goldspink, “sivin and four,” or other friends and relations in the world. So, when the preparatory clatter of knives and forks became louder, and the tramp and hurry of footmen more frequent, the two stood chatting and simpering together, suggestive of the “handsomest couple under the sun.” Mamma looked approvingly on, Mrs. Trattles congratulated herself on the success of her venture, while Mrs. Tartarman, with her saucy-nosed daughters, stood with well thrown back heads pitying the poor girl who was going to be made a fool of. Presently there was a mysterious movement in the throng, arms suddenly distended either singly or in pairs, a faded green baize curtain was drawn aside, and the company gradually proceeded from the sky canopied drawing-room of the outer ruin, to the canvas-covered refectory adjoining. Great was the gathering of crinoline, and squeezing past corners, and getting round tables, and beggings of pardons, and askings to be unloosed, and thanks for the favours, and wonderings of the ladies how they were ever to get themselves seated on such little narrow benches. Better far to have had a spread on the ground with unlimited circumference for each. However, there they were, and with no more space assigned than when ladies w
ere half their present size. At length all get wedged in somehow or other; and amidst serious reflections as to how they would look when they came out again, the Rev. Mr. Tmelove said a short grace, and the business of dinner began.
CHAPTER IX.
THE PICNIC.
WE HOLD THAT a pic-nic is not a pic-nic where there are well-arranged tables and powdered footmen to wait. It is merely an uncomfortable out-of-door dinner. A pic-nic should entail a little of the trouble and enterprise of life, gathering sticks, lighting the fire, boiling the pot, buying or stealing the potatoes. It is an excellent training for housekeeping, and affords a favourable opportunity for developing the skill of young ladies, in an art, that as servants go, they all seem likely to have to come to sooner or later, namely, waiting on themselves. Moreover, what one cooks oneself is always much better than what anybody else cooks for one, just as the money that a man makes is always a great deal more prized than what comes jingling in of itself.
