The Adventures of Philip

by William Makepeace Thackeray

fortune ever permit me to embrace my daughter-in-law, and take your children on

  my knee? You will speak kindly to them of their grandfather, will you not? Poor

  General Baynes, I have heard, used violent and unseemly language regarding me,

  which I most heartily pardon. I am grateful when I think that I never did

  General B. an injury: grateful and proud to accept benefits from my own son.

  These I treasure up in my heart; and still hope I shall be able to repay with

  something more substantial than my fondest prayers. Give my best wishes, then,

  to Miss Charlotte, and try and teach her to think kindly of her Philip's

  father."

  Miss Charlotte Baynes, who kept the name of Miss Grigsby, the governess, amongst

  all the roguish children of a facetious father, was with us one month, and her

  mamma expressed great cheerfulness at her absence, and at the thought that she

  had found such good friends. After two months, her uncle Major MacWhirter,

  returned from visiting his relations in the North, and offered to take his niece

  back to France again. He made this proposition with the jolliest air in the

  world, and as if his niece would jump for joy to go back to her mother. But to

  the major's astonishment, Miss Baynes turned quite pale, ran to her hostess,

  flung herself into that lady's arms and then there began an osculatory

  performance which perfectly astonished the good major. Charlotte's friend,

  holding Miss Baynes tight in her embrace, looked fiercely at the major over the

  girl's shoulder, and defied him to take her away from that sanctuary.

  "Oh, you dear, good dear friend!" Charlotte gurgled out, and sobbed I know not

  what more expressions of fondness and gratitude.

  But the truth is, that two sisters, or mother and daughter, could not love each

  other more heartily than these two personages. Mother and daughter forsooth! You

  should have seen Charlotte's piteous look when sometimes the conviction would

  come on her that she ought at length to go home to mamma; such a look as I can

  fancy Iphigenia casting on Agamemnon, when, in obedience to a painful sense of

  duty, he was about to�� to use the sacrificial knife. No, we all loved her. The

  children would howl at the idea of parting with their Miss Grigsby. Charlotte,

  in return, helped them to very pretty lessons in music and French��served hot,

  as it were, from her own recent studies at Tours��and a good daily governess

  operated on the rest of their education to everybody's satisfaction.

  And so months rolled on and our young favourite still remained with us. Mamma

  fed the little maid's purse with occasional remittances; and begged her hostess

  to supply her with all necessary articles from the milliner. Afterwards, it is

  true, Mrs. General Baynes �� But why enter upon these painful family disputes in

  a chapter which has been devoted to sentiment?

  As soon as Mr. Firmin received the letter above faithfully copied (with the

  exception of the pecuniary offer, which I do not consider myself at liberty to

  divulge), he hurried down from Thornhaugh Street to Westminster. He dashed by

  Buttons, the page, he took no notice of my wondering wife at the drawing-room

  door; he rushed to the second floor, bursting open the school-room door, where

  Charlotte was teaching our dear third daughter to play In my Cottage near a

  Wood.

  "Charlotte! Charlotte!" he cried out.

  "La, Philip! don't you see Miss Grigsby is giving us lessons?" said the

  children.

  But he would not listen to those wags, and still beckoned Charlotte to him. That

  young woman rose up and followed him out of the door, as, indeed, she would have

  followed him out of the window; and there, on the stairs, they read Dr. Firmin's

  letter, with their heads quite close together, you understand.

  "Two hundred a year more," said Philip, his heart throbbing so that he could

  hardly speak; "and your fifty��and two hundred the Gazette��and��"

  "Oh, Philip!" was all Charlotte could say, and then��There was a pretty group

  for the children to see, and for an artist to draw!

  CHAPTER III. WAYS AND MEANS.

  Of course any man of the world, who is possessed of decent prudence, will

  perceive that the idea of marrying on four hundred and fifty pounds a year so

  secured as was Master Philip's income, was preposterous and absurd. In the first

  place, you can't live on four hundred and fifty pounds a year, that is a

  certainty. People do live on less, I believe. But a life without a brougham,

  without a decent house, without claret for dinner, and a footman to wait, can

  hardly be called existence. Philip's income might fail any day. He might not

  please the American paper. He might quarrel with the Pall Mall Gazette. And then

  what would remain to him? Only poor little Charlotte's fifty pounds a year! So

  Philip's most intimate male friend��a man of the world, and with a good deal of

  experience��argued. Of course I was not surprised that Philip did not choose to

  take my advice: though I did not expect he would become so violently angry, call

  names almost, and use most rude expressions, when, at his express desire, this

  advice was tendered to him. If he did not want it, why did he ask for it? The

  advice might be unwelcome to him, but why did he choose to tell me at my own

  table, over my own claret, that it was the advice of a sneak and a worldling? My

  good fellow, that claret, though it is a second growth, and I can afford no

  better, costs seventy-two shillings a dozen. How much is six times three hundred

  and sixty-five? A bottle a day is the least you can calculate (the fellow would

  come to my house and drink two bottles to himself, with the utmost nonchalance).

  A bottle per diem of that light charet��of that second-growth stuff��costs one

  hundred and four guineas a year, do you understand? or, to speak plainly with

  you, one hundred and nine pounds four shillings!

  "Well," says Philip, "apr�s? We'll do without. Meantime I will take what I can

  get!" and he tosses off about a pint as he speaks (these mousseline glasses are

  not only enormous, but they break by dozens.) He tosses off a pint of my Larose,

  and gives a great roar of laughter, as if he had said a good thing.

  Philip Firmin is coarse and offensive at times, and Bickerton in holding this

  opinion is not altogether wrong.

  "I'll drink claret when I come to you, old boy," he says, grinning; "and at home

  I will have whiskey-and-water."

  "But suppose Charlotte is ordered claret?"

  "Well, she can have it," says this liberal lover; "a bottle will last her a

  week."

  "Don't you see," I shriek out, "that even a bottle a week costs something

  like��sixty by fifty-two��eighteen pounds a year?" (I own it is really only

  fifteen twelve; but, in the hurry of argument, a man may stretch a figure or

  so.) "Eighteen pounds for Charlotte's claret; as much, at least, you great boozy

  toper, for your whisky and beer. Why, you actually want a tenth part of your

  income for the liquor you consume! And then clothes; and then lodging; and then

  coals; and then doctor's bills; and then pocket-money; and then sea-side for the

  little dears. Just have the kin
dness to add these things up, and you will find

  that you have about two-and-ninepence left to pay the grocer and the butcher."

  "What you call prudence," says Philip, thumping the table, and, of course,

  breaking a glass, "I call cowardice��I call blasphemy! Do you mean, as a

  Christian man, to tell me that two young people, and a family if it should

  please heaven to send them one, cannot subsist upon five hundred pounds a year?

  Look round, sir, at the myriads of God's creatures who live, love, are happy and

  poor, and be ashamed of the wicked doubt which you utter!" And he starts up, and

  strides up and down the dining-room, curling his flaming moustache, and rings

  the bell fiercely, and says, "Johnson, I've broke a glass. Get me another."

  In the drawing-room, my wife asks what we two were fighting about? And, as

  Charlotte is up-stairs, telling the children stories as they are put to bed, or

  writing to her dear mamma, or what not, our friend bursts out with more rude and

  violent expressions than he had used in the dining-room over my glasses which he

  was smashing, tells my own wife that I am an atheist, or at best a miserable

  sceptic and Sadducee: that I doubt of the goodness of heaven, and am not

  thankful for my daily bread. And, with one of her kindling looks directed

  towards the young man, of course my wife sides with him. Miss Char presently

  came down from the young folks, and went to the piano, and played us Beethoven's

  Dream of Saint Jerome, which always soothes me, and charms me, so that I fancy

  it is a poem of Tennyson in music. And our children, as they sink off to sleep

  over-head, like to hear soft music, which soothes them into slumber, Miss Baynes

  says. And Miss Charlotte looks very pretty at her piano: and Philip lies gazing

  at her, with his great feet and hands tumbled over one of our arm-chairs. And

  the music, with its solemn cheer, makes us all very happy and kind-hearted, and

  ennobles us somehow as we listen. And my wife wears her benedictory look

  whenever she turns towards these young people. She has worked herself up to the

  opinion that yonder couple ought to marry. She can give chapter and verse for

  her belief. To doubt about the matter at all is wicked according to her notions.

  And there are certain points upon which, I humbly own, that I don't dare to

  argue with her.

  When the women of the house have settled a matter, is there much use in man's

  resistance? If my harem orders that I shall wear a yellow coat and pink

  trousers, I know that, before three months are over, I shall be walking about in

  rose-tendre and canary-coloured garments. It is the perseverance which conquers,

  the daily return to the object desired. Take my advice, my dear sir, when you

  see your womankind resolute about a matter, give up at once, and have a quiet

  life. Perhaps to one of these evening entertainments, where Miss Baynes played

  the piano, as she did very pleasantly, and Mr. Philip's great clumsy fist turned

  the leaves, little Mrs. Brandon would come tripping in, and as she surveyed the

  young couple, her remark would be, "Did you ever see a better suited couple?"

  When I came home from chambers, and passed the dining-room door, my eldest

  daughter with a knowing face would bar the way and say,"You mustn't go in there,

  papa! Miss Grigsby is there, and Master Philip is not to be disturbed at his

  lessons!" Mrs. Mugford had begun to arrange marriages between her young people

  and ours from the very first day she saw us; and Mrs. M.'s ch. filly Toddles,

  rising two years, and our three-year old colt Billyboy, were rehearsing in the

  nursery the endless little comedy which the grown-up young persons were

  performing in the drawing-room.

  With the greatest frankness Mrs. Mugford gave her opinion that Philip, with four

  or five hundred a year, would be no better than a sneak if he delayed to marry.

  How much had she and Mugford when they married, she would like to know? "Emily

  Street, Pentonville, was where we had apartments," she remarked; "we were

  pinched sometimes; but we owed nothing: and our housekeeping books I can show

  you." I believe Mrs. M. actually brought these dingy relics of her honeymoon for

  my wife's inspection. I tell you, my house was peopled with these friends of

  matrimony. Flies were for ever in requisition, and our boys were very sulky at

  having to sit for an hour at Shoolbred's, while certain ladies lingered there

  over blankets, tablecloths, and what not. Once I found my wife and Charlotte

  flitting about Wardour Street, the former lady much interested in a great Dutch

  cabinet, with a glass cupboard and corpulent drawers. And that cabinet was, ere

  long, carted off to Mrs. Brandon's, Thornhaugh Street; and in that glass

  cupboard there was presently to be seen a neat set of china for tea and

  breakfast. The end was approaching. That event, with which the third volume of

  the old novels used to close, was at hand. I am afraid our young people can't

  drive off from St. George's in a chaise and four, and that no noble relative

  will lend them his castle for the honeymoon. Well: some people cannot drive to

  happiness, even with four horses; and other folks can reach the goal on foot. My

  venerable Muse stoops down, unlooses her cothurnus with some difficulty, and

  prepares to fling that old shoe after the pair.

  Tell, venerable Muse! what were the marriage gifts which friendship provided for

  Philip and Charlotte? Philip's cousin, Ringwood Twysden, came simpering up to me

  at Bays's Club one afternoon, and said: "I hear my precious cousin is going to

  marry. I think I shall send him a broom to sweep a crossin'." I was nearly going

  to say, "This was a piece of generosity to be expected from your father's son;"

  but the fact is, that I did not think of this withering repartee until I was

  crossing St. James's Park on my way home, when Twysden of course was out of

  ear-shot. A great number of my best witticisms have been a little late in making

  their appearance in the world. If we could but hear the unspoken jokes, how we

  should all laugh; if we could but speak them, how witty we should be! When you

  have left the room, you have no notion what clever things I was going to say

  when you balked me by going away. Well, then, the fact is, the Twysden's family

  gave Philip nothing on his marriage, being the exact sum of regard which they

  professed to have for him.

  Mrs. Major MacWhirter gave the bride an Indian brooch, representing the Taj

  Mahal at Agra, which General Baynes had given to his sister-in-law in old days.

  At a later period, it is true, Mrs. Mac asked Charlotte for the brooch back

  again; but this was when many family quarrels had raged between the relatives��

  quarrels which to describe at length would be to tax too much the writer and the

  readers of this history.

  Mrs. Mugford presented an elegant plated coffee-pot, six drawing-room almanacs

  (spoils of the Pall Mall Gazette), and fourteen richly cut jelly-glasses, most

  useful for negus, if the young couple gave evening parties, which dinners they

  would not be able to afford.

  Mrs. Barndon made an offering of two tablecloths and twelve dinner napkins, most


  beautifully worked, and I don't know how much house linen.

  The Lady of the Present Writer��Twelve teaspoons in bullion, and a pair of

  sugar-tongs. Mrs. Baynes, Philip's mother-in-law, sent him also a pair of

  sugar-tongs, of a light manufacture, easily broken. He keeps a tong to the

  present day, and speaks very satirically regarding that relic.

  Philip's Inn of Court��A bill for commons and Inn taxes, with the Treasurer's

  compliments.

  And these, I think, formed the items of poor little Charlotte's meagre

  trousseau. Before Cinderella went to the ball she was almost as rich as our

  little maid. Charlotte's mother sent a grim consent to the child's marriage, but

  declined herself to attend it. She was ailing and poor. Her year's widowhood was

  just over. She had her other children to look after. My impression is that Mrs.

  Baynes thought that she could be out of Philip's power so long as she remained

  abroad, and that the general's savings would be secure from him. So she

  delegated her authority to Philip's friends in London, and sent her daughter a

  moderate wish for her happiness, which may or may not have profited the young

  people.

  "Well, my dear? You are rich compared to what I was, when I married," little

  Mrs. Brandon said to her young friend. "You will have a good husband. That is

  more than I had. You will have good friends; and I was almost alone for a

  time,until it pleased God to befriend me." It was not without a feeling of awe

  that we saw these young people commence that voyage of life on which henceforth

  they were to journey together; and I am sure that of the small company who

  accompanied them to the silent little chapel where they were joined in marriage

  there was not one who did not follow them with tender good wishes and heartfelt

  prayers. They had a little purse provided for a month's holiday. They had

  health, hope, good spirits, good friends. I have never learned that life's

  trials were over after marriage; only lucky is he who has a loving companion to

  share them. As for the lady with whom Charlotte had stayed before her marriage,

  she was in a state of the most lachrymose sentimentality. She sate on the bed in

  the chamber which the little maid had vacated. Her tears flowed copiously. She

  knew not why, she could not tell how the girl had wound herself round her

  maternal heart. And I think if heaven had decreed this young creature should be

  poor, it had sent her many blessings and treasures in compensation.

  Every respectable man and woman in London will, of course, pity these young

  people, and reprobate the mad risk which they were running, and yet, by the

  influence and example of a sentimental wife probably, so madly sentimental have

  I become, that I own sometimes I almost fancy these misguided wretches are to be

  envied.

  A melancholy little chapel it is where they were married, and stands hard by our

  house. We did not decorate the church with flowers, or adorn the beadles with

  white ribbons. We had, I must confess, a dreary little breakfast, not in the

  least enlivened by Mugford's jokes, who would make a speech de circonstance,

  which was not, I am thankful to say, reported in the Pall Mall Gazette. "We

  shan't charge you for advertising the marriage there, my dear," Mrs. Mugford

  said. "And I've already took it myself to Mr. Burjoyce." Mrs. Mugford had

  insisted upon pinning a large white favour upon John, who drove from Hampstead:

  but that was the only ornament present at the nuptial ceremony, much to the

  disappointment of the good lady. There was a very pretty cake, with two doves in

  sugar, on the top, which the Little Sister made and sent, and no other hymeneal

  emblem. Our little girls as bridesmaids appeared, to be sure, in new bonnets and

  dresses, but everybody else looked so quiet and demure, that when we went into

  the church, three or four street urchins knocking about the gate, said,"Look at