The Adventures of Philip

by William Makepeace Thackeray

carriage, and she has come to call upon you, and ask you to her balls, I

  suppose."

  Mrs. Baynes was delighted at this call. And when she said, "I'm sure I don't

  value fine people, or their fine parties, or their fine carriages, but I wish

  that my dear child should see the world,"��I don't believe a word which Mrs.

  Baynes said. She was much more pleased than Charlotte at the idea of visiting

  this fine lady; or else, why should she have coaxed, and wheedled, and been so

  particularly gracious to the general all the evening? She wanted a new gown. The

  truth is, her yellow was very shabby; whereas Charlotte, in plain white muslin,

  looked pretty enough to be able to dispense with the aid of any French milliner.

  I fancy a consultation with madame and Mrs. Bunch. I fancy a fly ordered, and a

  visit to the gown is settled with the milliner, I fancy the terror on Mrs.

  Baynes' wizened face when she ascertains the amount of the bill. To do her

  justice, the general's wife had spend little upon her own homely person. She

  chose her gowns ugly, but cheap. There were so many backs to clothe in that

  family that the thrifty mother did not heed the decoration of her own.

  CHAPTER VIII. NEC DULCES AMORES SPERNE, PUER, NEQUE TU CHOREAS.

  "My dear," Mrs. Baynes said to her daughter, "you are going out a great deal in

  the world now. You will go to a great number of places where poor Philip cannot

  hope to be admitted."

  "Not admit Philip, mamma! then I'm sure I don't want to go," cries the girl.

  "Time enough to leave off going to parties when you can't afford it, and marry

  him. When I was a lieutenant's wife, I didn't go to any parties out of the

  regiment, my dear!"

  "Oh, then, I am sure I shall never want to go out!" Charlotte declares.

  "You fancy he will always stop at home, I daresay. Men are not all so domestic

  as your papa. Very few love to stop at home like him. Indeed, I may say that I

  have made his home comfortable. But one thing is clear, my child. Philip can't

  always expect to go where we go. He is not in the position in life. Recollect,

  your father is a general officer, C. B., and may be K.C.B. soon, and your mother

  is a general officer's lady. We may go anywhere. I might have gone to the

  drawing-room at home if I chose. Lady Biggs would have been delighted to present

  me. Your aunt has been to the drawing-room, and she is only Mrs. Major Mac

  Whirter; and most absurd it was of Mac to let her go. But she rules him in

  everything, and they have no children. I have, goodness knows! I sacrifice

  myself for my children. You little know what I deny myself for my children. I

  said to Lady Biggs, 'No, Lady Biggs; my husband may go. He should go. He has his

  uniform, and it will cost him nothing except a fly and a bouquet for the man who

  drives; but I will not spend money on myself for the hire of diamonds and

  feathers, and, though I yield in loyalty to no person, I daresay my Sovereign

  won't miss me.' And I don't think her Majesty did. She has other things to think

  of besides Mrs. General Baynes, I suppose. She is a mother, and can appreciate a

  mother's sacrifices for her children."��If I have not hitherto given you

  detailed reports of Mrs. General Baynes' conversation, I don't think, my

  esteemed reader, you will be very angry.

  "Now, child," the general's lady continued, "let me warn you not to talk much to

  Philip about those places to which you go without him, and to which his position

  in life does not allow of his coming. Hide anything from him? Oh, dear, no! Only

  for his own good, you understand. I don't tell everything to your papa. I should

  only worrit him and vex him. When anything will please him, and make him happy,

  then I tell him. And about Philip. Philip, I must say it, my dear��I must as a

  mother say it��has his faults. He is an envious man. Don't look shocked. He

  thinks very well of himself; and having been a great deal spoiled, and made too

  much of in his unhappy father's time, he is so proud and haughty that he forgets

  his position, and thinks he ought to live with the highest society. Had Lord

  Ringwood left him a fortune, as Philip led us to expect when we gave our consent

  to this most unlucky match��for that my dear child should marry a beggar is most

  unlucky and most deplorable; I can't help saying so, Charlotte,��if I were on my

  deathbed I couldn't help saying so; and I wish with all my heart we had never

  seen or heard of him.��There! Don't go off in one of your tantrums! What was I

  saying, pray? I say that Philip is in no position, or rather in a very humble

  one, which��a mere newspaper-writer and a subaltern too��everybody acknowledges

  to be. And if he hears us talking about our parties, to which we have a right to

  go��to which you have a right to go with your mother, a general officer's

  lady��why, he'll be offended. He won't like to hear about them and think he

  can't be invited; and you had better not talk about them at all, or about the

  people you meet, you dance with. At Mrs. Hely's you may dance with Lord

  Headbury, the ambassador's son. And if you tell Philip he will be offended. He

  will say that you boast about it. When I was only a lieutenant's wife at

  Barrackpore, Mrs. Captain Capers used to go to Calcutta to the Government House

  balls. I didn't go. But I was offended, and I used to say that Flora Capers gave

  herself airs, and was always boasting of her intimacy with the Marchioness of

  Hastings. We don't like our equals to be better off than ourselves. Mark my

  words. And if you talk to Philip about the people whom you meet in society, and

  whom he can't from his unfortunate station expect to know, you will offend him.

  That was why I nudged you to-day when you were going on about Mr. Hely. Anything

  so absurd! I saw Philip getting angry at once, and biting his moustaches, as he

  always does when he is angry��and swears quite out loud��so vulgar! There! you

  are going to be angry again, my love; I never saw anything like you! Is this my

  Charly who never was angry? I know the world, dear, and you don't. Look at me,

  how I manage your papa, and I tell you don't talk to Philip about things which

  offend him! No, dearest, kiss your poor old mother who loves you. Go upstairs

  and bathe your eyes, and come down happy to dinner." And at dinner Mrs. General

  Baynes was uncommonly gracious to Philip: and when gracious she was especially

  odious to Philip, whose magnanimous nature accommodated itself ill to the

  wheedling artifices of an ill-bred old woman.

  Following this wretched mother's advice, my poor Charlotte spoke scarcely at all

  to Philip of the parties to which she went, and the amusements which she enjoyed

  without him. I daresay Mrs. Baynes was quite happy in thinking that she was

  "guiding" her child rightly. As if a coarse woman, because she is mean, and

  greedy, and hypocritical, and fifty years old, has a right to lead a guileless

  nature into wrong! Ah! if some of us old folks were to go to school to our

  children, I am sure, madam, it would do us a great deal of good. There is a fund

  of good sense and honourable feeling about my great-grandson Tommy, which is

  more valuable than all his grandpapa's ex
perience and knowledge of the world.

  Knowledge of the world forsooth! Compromise, selfishness modified, and double

  dealing. Tom disdains a lie. When he wants a peach, he roars for it. If his

  mother wishes to go to a party, she coaxes, and wheedles, and manages, and

  smirks, and curtseys for months, in order to get her end; takes twenty rebuffs,

  and comes up to the scratch again smiling;��and this woman is for ever lecturing

  her daughters, and preaching to her sons upon virtue, honesty, and moral

  behaviour!

  Mrs. Hely's little party at the H�tel de la Terrasse was very pleasant and

  bright; and Miss Charlotte enjoyed it, although her swain was not present. But

  Philip was pleased that his little Charlotte should be happy. She beheld with

  wonderment Parisian duchesses, American millionnaires, dandies from the

  embassies, deputies and peers of France with large stars and wigs like papa. She

  gaily described her party to Philip; described, that is to say, everything but

  her own success, which was undoubted. There were many beauties at Mrs. Hely's,

  but nobody fresher or prettier. The Miss Blacklocks retired very early and in

  the worst possible temper. Prince Slyboots did not in the least heed their going

  away. His thoughts were all fixed upon little Charlotte. Charlotte's mamma saw

  the impression which the girl made, and was filled with a hungry joy.

  Good-natured Mrs. Hely complimented her on her daughter. "Thank God, she is as

  good as she is pretty," said the mother, I am sure speaking seriously this time

  regarding her daughter. Prince Slyboots danced with scarce anybody else. He

  raised a perfect whirlwind of compliments round about Charlotte. She was quite a

  simple person, and did not understand one-tenth part of what he said to her. He

  strewed her path with roses of poesy: he scattered garlands of sentiment before

  her all the way from the ante-chamber downstairs, and so to the fly which was in

  waiting to take her and her parents home to the boarding-house. "By George,

  Charlotte, I think you have smitten that fellow," cries the general, who was

  infinitely amused by young Hely��his raptures, his affectations, his long hair,

  and what Baynes called his low dress. A slight white tape and a ruby button

  confined Hely's neck. His hair waved over his shoulders. Baynes had never seen

  such a specimen. At the mess of the stout 120th, the lads talked of their dogs,

  horses, and sport. A young civilian, smattering in poetry, chattering in a dozen

  languages, scented, smiling, perfectly at ease with himself and the world, was a

  novelty to the old officer.

  And now the Queen's birthday arrived��and that it may arrive for many scores of

  years yet to come is, I am sure, the prayer of all of us��and with the birthday

  his Excellency Lord Estridge's grand annual f�te in honour of his sovereign. A

  card for the ball was left at Madame Smolensk's, for General, Mrs. and Miss

  Baynes; and no doubt Monsieur Slyboots Walsingham Hely was the artful agent by

  whom the invitation was forwarded. Once more the general's veteran uniform came

  out from the tin-box, with its dingy epaulets and little cross and ribbon. His

  wife urged on him strongly the necessity of having a new wig, wigs being very

  cheap and good at Paris��but Baynes said a new wig would make his old coat look

  very shabby; and a new uniform would cost more money than he would like to

  afford. So shabby he went de cape � pied, with a moulting feather, a threadbare

  suit, a tarnished wig, and a worn-out lace, sibi constans. Boots, trousers,

  sash, coat, were all old and worse for wear, and "faith," says he, "my face

  follows suit." A brave, silent man was Baynes; with a twinkle of humour in his

  lean, wrinkled face.

  And if General Baynes was shabbily attired at the Embassy ball, I think I know a

  friend of mine who was shabby too. In the days of his prosperity, Mr. Philip was

  parcus cultor et infrequens of balls, routes, and ladies' company. Perhaps

  because his father was angered at Philip's neglect of his social advantages and

  indifference as to success in the world, Philip was the more neglectful and

  indifferent. The elder's comedy-smiles, and solemn hypocritical politeness,

  caused scorn and revolt on the part of the younger man. Philip despised the

  humbug, and the world to which such humbug could be welcome. He kept aloof from

  tea-parties then: his evening-dress clothes served him for a long time. I cannot

  say how old his dress-coat was at the time of which we are writing. But he had

  been in the habit of respecting that garment and considering it new and handsome

  for many years past. Meanwhile the coat had shrunk, or its wearer had grown

  stouter; and his grand embroidered, embossed, illuminated, carved and gilt

  velvet dress waistcoat, too, had narrowed, had become absurdly tight and short,

  and I daresay was the laughing-stock of many of Philip's acquaintances, whilst

  he himself, poor simple fellow, was fancying that it was a most splendid article

  of apparel. You know in the Palais Royal they hang out the most splendid

  reach-me-down dressing-gowns, waistcoats, and so forth. "No," thought Philip,

  coming out of his cheap dining-house, and swaggering along the arcades, and

  looking at the tailors' shops, with his hands in his pockets. "My brown velvet

  dress waistcoat with the gold sprigs, which I had made at college, is a much

  more tasty thing than these gaudy ready-made articles. And my coat is old

  certainly, but the brass buttons are still very bright and handsome, and, in

  fact, it is a most becoming and gentlemanlike thing." And under this delusion

  the honest fellow dressed himself in his old clothes, lighted a pair of candles,

  and looked at himself with satisfaction in the looking-glass, drew on a pair of

  cheap gloves which he had bought, walked by the Quays, and over the Deputies'

  Bridge, across the Place Louis XV., and strutted up the Faubourg St. Honor� to

  the Hotel of the British Embassy. A half-mile queue of carriages was formed

  along the street, and of course the entrance to the hotel was magnificently

  illuminated.

  A plague on those cheap gloves! Why had not Philip paid three francs for a pair

  of gloves, instead of twenty-nine sous? Mrs. Baynes had found a capital cheap

  glove shop, whither poor Phil had gone in the simplicity of his heart; and now

  as he went in under the grand illuminated porte-coch�re, Philip saw that the

  gloves had given way at the thumbs, and that his hands appeared through the

  rents, as red as red as raw beefsteaks. It is wonderful how red hands will look

  through holes in white gloves. "And there's that hole in my boot, too," thought

  Phil; but he had put a little ink over the seam, and so the rent was

  imperceptible. The coat and waistcoat were tight, and of a past age. Never mind.

  The chest was broad, the arms were muscular and long, and Phil's face, in the

  midst of a halo of fair hair and flaming whiskers, looked brave, honest, and

  handsome. For a while his eyes wandered fiercely and restlessly all about the

  room from group to group; but now��ah! now��they were settled. They had met

  another pair of eyes, which lighted up with glad welcome when th
ey beheld him.

  Two young cheeks mantled with a sweet blush. These were Charlotte's cheeks: and

  hard by them were mamma's, of a very different colour. But Mrs. General Baynes

  had a knowing turban on, and a set of garnets round her old neck, like

  gooseberries set in gold.

  They admired the rooms: they heard the names of the great folks who arrived, and

  beheld many famous personages. They made their curtseys to the ambassadress.

  Confusion! With a great rip, the thumb of one of those cheap gloves of Philip's

  parts company from the rest of the glove, and he is obliged to wear it crumpled

  up in his hand: a dreadful mishap��for he is going to dance with Charlotte, and

  he will have to give his hand to the vis-�-vis.

  Who comes up smiling, with a low neck, with waving curls and whiskers, pretty

  little hands exquisitely gloved, and tiny feet? 'Tis Hely Walsingham, lightest

  in the dance. Most affably does Mrs. General Baynes greet the young fellow. Very

  brightly and happily do Charlotte's eyes glance towards her favourite partner.

  It is certain that poor Phil can't hope at all to dance like Hely. "And see what

  nice neat feet and hands he has got," says Mrs. Baynes. "Comme il est bien

  gant�! A gentleman ought to be always well gloved."

  "Why did you send me to the twenty-nine-sous-shop?" says poor Phil, looking at

  his tattered handshoes, and red obtrusive thumb.

  "Oh, you!"��(here Mrs. Baynes shrugs her yellow old shoulders.) "Your hands

  would burst through any gloves! How do you do, Mr. Hely! Is your mamma here? Of

  course she is! What a delightful party she gave us! The dear ambassadress looks

  quite unwell��most pleasing manners, I am sure; Lord Estridge, what a perfect

  gentleman!"

  The Bayneses were just come. For what dance was Miss Baynes disengaged? "As many

  as ever you like!" cries Charlotte, who, in fact, called Hely her little

  dancing-master, and never thought of him except as a partner. "Oh, too much

  happiness! Oh, that this could last for ever!" sighed Hely, after a waltz,

  polka, mazurka, I know not what, and fixing on Charlotte the full blaze of his

  beauteous blue eyes. "For ever?" cries Charlotte, laughing. "I'm very fond of

  dancing, indeed; and you dance beautifully; but I don't know that I should like

  to dance for ever." Ere the words are over, he is whirling her round the room

  again. His little feet fly with surprising agility. His hair floats behind him.

  He scatters odours as he spins. The handkerchief with which he fans his pale

  brow is like a cloudy film of muslin��and poor old Philip sees with terror that

  his pocket-handkerchief has got three great holes in it. His nose and one eye

  appeared through one of the holes while Phil was wiping his forehead. It was

  very hot. He was very hot. He was hotter, though standing still, than young Hely

  who was dancing. "He! he! I compliment you on your gloves, and your

  handkerchief, I'm sure," sniggers Mrs. Baynes, with a toss of her turban. Has it

  not been said that a bull is a strong, courageous, and noble animal, but that a

  bull in a china-shop is not in his place? "There you go. Thank you! I wish you'd

  go somewhere else," cries Mrs. Baynes in a fury. Poor Philip's foot has just

  gone through her flounce. How red he is! how much hotter than ever! There go

  Hely and Charlotte, whirling round like two operadancers! Philip grinds his

  teeth, he buttons his coat across his chest. How very tight it feels! How

  savagely his eyes glare! Do young men still look savage and solemn at balls? An

  ingenuous young Englishman ought to do that duty of dancing, of course. Society

  calls upon him. But I doubt whether he ought to look cheerful during the

  performance, or flippantly engage in so grave a matter.

  As Charlotte's sweet round face beamed smiles upon Philip over Hely's shoulders,