Little Mr Bouncer and His Friend Verdant Green/Chapter 6
CHAPTER VI.
LITTLE MR. BOUNCER ENTERTAINS HIS FRIENDS, AND IS ENTERTAINED BY THEM.
IELDING themselves willingly to the pleasures of the hour and the enjoyments of the breakfast-table, little Mr. Bouncer's guests made themselves happy in each other's company, knowing that on the morrow they would all be leaving Oxford, and would be travelling north, south, east, and west, preparatory to making more extensive (as well as expensive) tours on the Continent and elsewhere, and otherwise beguiling the months of the Long Vacation, until October should once again see them reassembled in their beautiful City of Colleges.
In the interval, Brazenface would be given up to scouts and bed-makers; and while Mr. Robert Filcher would stand as umpire at a scouts' cricket-match, Mrs. Tester would preside at a tea-party in the porter's lodge. Workmen would also be whistling and shouting for "mortar" in the passages and on the staircases where the "mortar-boards" were daily seen during Term-time; the necessary repairs would be effected; the burnt plank where a lighted cigar had been dropped, and whereby the College had been nearly set on fire, would be replaced; the yellow coruscation would be removed from the wall where an egg that had been playfully shied at a Freshman's head had missed its mark but left a stain; whitewash would also obliterate the various works of art, executed in burnt cork, on the
staircase walls, by little Mr. Bouncer and other ameteurs, in which grandeur of effect and satirical expression were sought for, rather than delicacy of execution and flattery of portraiture; the smashed panel, through which a small but highly obnoxious Freshman had been propelled, would be made good; twisted gas-pipes would be repaired, and Brazenface would be put into apple-pie order.
Though it seemed to stand in little need of improvement, as it looked at the present moment, with the bright June sun shining full upon it, and with the unwonted bits of gay colour gleaming here and there from the dresses of the ladies, as they appeared at some of the mullioned windows, or strolled across those grass-plats which might not be trodden on by the feet of undergraduates. Cheery talk and laughter were also borne to the ear from Quads and rooms; and a due proportion of it came from the room of little Mr. Bouncer. Huz and Buz had finished their breakfast of chicken-bones, and had been much annoyed by Mr. Smalls, who had been vainly endeavouring to teach them to sit up and hold short pipes in their mouths—a proceeding which they had resented with much dudgeon.
"They think it low," said their master, "to do tricks like Circus dogs, even though you held out the inducement of acting as Clown. You 'd better let them alone. They 've a long journey to take to-morrow, and it won't do to upset their feelings to-day. Help your self to liquors, Smalls, and don't interfere with the enjoyments of the animals. I shall be glad to hear your views on things in general, particularly on the political condition of Europe." And little Mr. Bouncer made himself comfortable, with his legs over the arm of his easy chair.
"Well; you know old Peter?" replied Mr. Smalls, as though he were hastening to comply with his host's request.
"What! Peter the Great? Yes; I 've known him from a baby. Fire away, my boy," said Mr. Bouncer.
"Old Peter, the cake-man, is the party referred to," explained Mr. Smalls—"the old fellow who is allowed to come into the men's rooms. Well, the other day, Tom Higgins was in his bed-room, and heard old Peter come into the other room. Tom kept quiet, and old Peter evidently thought that there was no one at home. Presently, Tom heard old Peter taking the stopper out
of a decanter that was on the table, and holding a monologue dialogue—if I may use the expression—the while he helped himself to the port. But he did so in a very original way. All the while the performance was going on, old Peter was saying, 'Take a glass of wine, Peter.' 'Thankee, sir; I 've no objection; here 's your health, sir.' 'Do you like this wine, Peter?' 'Very much indeed, sir, thank you.' 'Then take another glass, Peter.' 'Much obliged, sir.' 'Take another glass, Peter; it won't hurt you.' 'Well; I don't think it will, sir; so I drinks to-wards you.' Here Tom thought it time to interfere; or, perhaps, old Peter would have kept up the imaginary dialogue until he had finished the decanter; so he knocked down a chair in his bed-room, and, under cover of the noise, old Peter bolted."
"The old rascal!" exclaimed Charles Larkyns, who was puffing at a long "Churchwarden" which he considered to be the very king of pipes, and that every inch of its "yard of clay"—if it were a true Broseley—was priceless. "The old rascal! But they are all alike, whether cake-men or scouts. It was only last week that I missed some of my best weeds, and I fancied that Robert had bagged them. I did not quite like to tax him with making free with them; but, at a venture, I said, 'How do you like my tobacco, Robert?' Instead of being taken aback by the question, he at once replied, with admirable coolness and self-possession, 'Not so much as the last lot you had, sir; they're a trifle too strong for summer smoking.' Now, I call that slightly cool. Perhaps the next thing will be that we are expected to supply our scouts with cigars."
"And submit the brands to them before they condescend to make a selection," suggested Lord Buttonhole's son, Mr. Flexible Shanks. "What a cheesy idea!"
"That reminds me," said Verdant Green, "that I intended to ask you if it was the custom to do what Mrs. Tester, my bed-maker, has done. The lock of my tea-chest has been out of order for some time; in fact, ever since Mrs. Tester used it in showing me how to make tea. I told Robert to get it mended; but I suppose that he forgot to do so."
"His memory would be safe to be bad on that point," observed little Mr. Bouncer. "It's an amiable weakness of his."
"So," continued Verdant, "as I found that I got through my tea very rapidly, I shut up the tea-chest in my cupboard. But Mrs. Tester said that the cupboard must be dusted; so I let her dust it; but when I looked in the chest all the tea was gone."
"I suppose that she had dusted that also," interpolated Charles Larkyns; "without leaving you even the tea-dust."
"I thought it better to mention it to Mrs. Tester, and asked her if she knew anything about it. She said, oh, yes! she had taken it, because 'gentlemen in general liked their tea-chestes to be cleared out, so that they might begin afresh next Term.' Is that the case?" asked Mr. Verdant Green.
"Well, I expect it is—with Freshmen," replied Charles Larkyns; "but you will be able to begin afresh next Term, old fellow, without being a Freshman; and you can then be quits with old Mother Tester, and wide awake to her pickings and stealings. Has she got much brandy out of you lately, eh, Verdant?"
"Not much," replied that goodnatured gentleman. "Her spasms began to be somewhat of a bore; for, she was always attacked by them whenever she found me alone in the room; and as I did not like to refuse her request to ease them with three drops of brandy on a lump of sugar—which was the remedy that she was accustomed to take whenever she was suffering from an attack—I have tried, lately, to avoid her, and to go out whenever I thought she was coming in."
"It 's the spazzums, my good young sir!" groaned Mrs. Tester, dropping courtesys at every sentence, like the beats of a conductor's baton. "To which you be'old me a hafflicted martyr. And can only be heased with three spots of brandy on a lump of sugar. And how I am to get through these spazzums doorin' the veccation. Without a havin' em heased by going to your cupboard. For just three spots o' brandy on a lump o' sugar. Is a summat as I am afeerd to think on, my good young sir."
Whereupon Mrs. Tester was so completely overcome by the mingled pain of spasms and the prospect of losing Mr. Verdant Green's source of relief, that the Freshman was weak enough to present her with an extra half-sovereign for the express purpose of supplying her, during his absence, with the means of obtaining her accustomed medicine.
"Which a half sufferin', my good young sir!" said Mrs. Tester, as she pocketed the gold coin, "is more than I expected on. And will hease my spazzums like the Poor Man's Friend. Which my own son once'st gave me a bottle on. As had beautiful red whiskers with a tendency to drink. And was known to his friends by a strawbery mark in the small of his back. And was fine growed and the very moral of you, my good young sir,—which drink were his rewing and enlisted him for a soger,—when the yaller fever cut him off like a flower in the West Ingies,—which the remembrance brings on the spazzums, to which I 'm a hafflicted martyr,—and my grateful thanks to you, my good young sir, and wishin' you a safe journey 'ome and 'ealth and 'appiness."
But we are somewhat anticipating events. It was not yet the next morning, nor was little Mr. Bouncer's breakfast at an end.