Эдвард Бульвер-Литтон - What Will He Do with It? — Complete

“A great scholar,” whispered Mr. Williams.—Aloud: “and I’ve nothing to say against your precedents, sir. I think you have made out that part of the case. But, after all, a learned dog is not so very uncommon as to be in itself the striking attraction which you appear to suppose.”

“It is not the mere learning of my dog of which I boast,” replied the Comedian. “Dogs may be learned, and men too; but it is the way that learning is imparted, whether by dog or man, for the edification of the masses, in order, as Pope expresses himself, ‘to raise the genius and to mend the heart’ that alone adorns the possessor, exalts the species, interests the public, and commands the respect of such judges as I see before me.” The grand bow.

“Ah!” said Mr. Williams, hesitatingly, “sentiments that do honour to your head and heart; and if we could, in the first instance, just see the dog privately.”

“‘Nothing easier!” said the Comedian. “Will you do me the honour to meet him at tea this evening?”

“Rather will you not come and take tea at my house?” said the Mayor, with a shy glance towards Mr. Williams.

THE COMEDIAN.—“You are very kind; but my time is so occupied that I have long since made it a rule to decline all private invitations out of my own home. At my years, Mr. Mayor, one may be excused for taking leave of society and its forms; but you are comparatively young men. I presume on the authority of these gray hairs, and I shall expect you this evening,—say at nine o’clock.” The Actor waved his hand graciously and withdrew.

“A scholar AND a gentleman,” said Williams, emphatically. And the Mayor, thus authorized to allow vent to his kindly heart, added, “A humourist, and a pleasant one. Perhaps he is right, and our poor operatives would thank us more for a little innocent amusement than for those lectures, which they may be excused for thinking rather dull, since even you fell asleep when Professor Long got into the multilocular shell of the very first class of cephalous mollusca; and it is my belief that harmless laughter has a good moral effect upon the working class,—only don’t spread it about that I said so, for we know excellent persons of a serious turn of mind whose opinions that sentiment might shock.”

HISTORICAL PROBLEM: “Is Gentleman Waife a swindler or a man of genius?” ANSWER: “Certainly a swindler, if he don’t succeed.” Julius Caesar owed two millions when he risked the experiment of being general in Gaul. If Julius Caesar had not lived to cross the Rubicon and pay off his debts, what would his creditors have called Julius Caesar?

I need not say that Mr. Hartopp and his foreman came duly to tea, but the Comedian exhibited Sir Isaac’s talents very sparingly,—just enough to excite admiration without sating curiosity. Sophy, whose pretty face and well-bred air were not unappreciated, was dismissed early to bed by a sign from her grandfather, and the Comedian then exerted his powers to entertain his visitors, so that even Sir Isaac was soon forgotten. Hard task, by writing, to convey a fair idea of this singular vagrant’s pleasant vein. It was not so much what he said as the way of saying it, which gave to his desultory talk the charm of humour. He had certainly seen an immense deal of life somehow or other; and without appearing at the time to profit much by observation, without perhaps being himself conscious that he did profit, there was something in the very enfantillage of his loosest prattle, by which, with a glance of the one lustrous eye and a twist of the mobile lip, he could convey the impression of an original genius playing with this round world of ours—tossing it up, catching it again—easily as a child plays with its party-coloured ball. His mere book-knowledge was not much to boast of, though early in life he must have received a fair education. He had a smattering of the ancient classics, sufficient, perhaps, to startle the unlearned. If he had not read them, he had read about them; and at various odds and ends of his life he had picked up acquaintance with the popular standard modern writers. But literature with him was the smallest stripe in the party-coloured ball. Still it was astonishing how far and wide the Comedian could spread the sands of lore that the winds had drifted round the door of his playful, busy intellect. Where, for instance, could he ever have studied the nature and prospects of Mechanics’ Institutes? and yet how well he seemed to understand them. Here, perhaps, his experience in one kind of audience helped him to the key to all miscellaneous assemblages. In fine, the man was an actor; and if he had thought fit to act the part of Professor Long himself, he would have done it to the life.

The two burghers had not spent so pleasant an evening for many years. As the clock struck twelve, the Mayor, whose gig had been in waiting a whole hour to take him to his villa, rose reluctantly to depart.

“And,” said Williams, “the bills must be out to-morrow. What shall we advertise?”

“The simpler the better,” said Waife; “only pray head the performance with the assurance that it is under the special patronage of his worship the Mayor.”

The Mayor felt his breast swell as if he had received some overwhelming personal obligation.

“Suppose it run thus,” continued the Comedian,—“Illustrations from Domestic Life and Natural History, with LIVE examples: PART FIRST—THE DOG!”

“It will take,” said the Mayor: “dogs are such popular animals!”

“Yes,” said Williams; “and though for that very reason some might think that by the ‘live example of a dog’ we compromised the dignity of the Institute, still the importance of Natural History—”

“And,” added the Comedian, “the sanctifying influences of domestic life—”

“May,” concluded Mr. Williams, “carry off whatever may seem to the higher order of minds a too familiar attraction in the—dog!”

“I do not fear the result,” said Waife, “provided the audience be sufficiently numerous; for that (which is an indispensable condition to a fair experiment) I issue hand-bills, only where distributed by the Mayor.”

“Don’t be too sanguine. I distributed bills on behalf of Professor Long, and the audience was not numerous. How ever, I will do my best. Is there nothing more in which I can be of use to you, Mr. Chapman?”

“Yes, later.” Williams took alarm, and approached the Mayor’s breast-pocket protectingly. The Comedian withdrew him aside and whispered, “I intend to give the Mayor a little outline of the exhibition, and bring him into it, in order that his fellow-townsmen may signify their regard for him by a cheer; it will please his good heart, and be touching, you’ll see—mum!” Williams shook the Comedian by the hand, relieved, affected, and confiding.

The visitors departed; and the Comedian lighted his hand-candlestick, whistled to Sir Isaac, and went to bed without one compunctious thought upon the growth of his bill and the deficit in his pockets. And yet it was true, as Sophy implied, that the Comedian had an honest horror of incurring debt. He generally thought twice before he risked owing even the most trifling bill; and when the bill came in, if it left him penniless, it was paid. And, now, what reckless extravagance! The best apartments! dinner, tea, in the first hotel of the town! half-a-crown to a porter! That lavish mode of life renewed with the dawning sun! not a care for the morrow; and I dare not conjecture how few the shillings in that purse. What aggravation, too, of guilt! Bills incurred without means under a borrowed name! I don’t pretend to be a lawyer; but it looks to me very much like swindling. Yet the wretch sleeps. But are we sure that we are not shallow moralists? Do we carry into account the right of genius to draw bills upon the Future? Does not the most prudent general sometimes burn his ships? Does not the most upright merchant sometimes take credit on the chance of his ventures? May not that peaceful slumberer be morally sure that he has that argosy afloat in his own head, which amply justifies his use of the “Saracen’s”? If his plan should fail? He will tell you that is impossible! But if it should fail, you say. Listen; there runs a story-I don’t vouch for its truth: I tell it as it was told to me—there runs a storv that in the late Russian war a certain naval veteran, renowned for professional daring and scientific invention, was examined before some great officials as to the chances of taking Cronstadt. “If you send me,” said the admiral, “with so many ships of the line, and so many gunboats, Cronstadt of course will be taken.” “But,” said a prudent lord, “suppose it should not be taken?” “That is impossible: it must be taken!” “Yes,” persisted my lord, “you think so, no doubt; but still, if it should not be taken,—what then?” “What then?—why, there’s an end of the British fleet!” The great men took alarm, and that admiral was not sent. But they misconstrued the meaning of his answer. He meant not to imply any considerable danger to the British fleet. He meant to prove that one hypothesis was impossible by the suggestion of a counter-impossibility more self-evident. “It is impossible but what I shall take Cronstadt!” “But if you don’t take it!” “It is impossible but what I shall take it; for if I don’t take it, there’s an end of the British fleet; and as it is impossible that there should be an end of the British fleet, it is impossible that I should not take Cronstadt!”—Q.E.D.