The Christmas Books of Mr. M.A. TitmarshThackeray, William Makepeace
General
The Christmas Books of Mr. M.A. Titmarsh
Thackeray, William Makepeace
Christmas stories, English
When Lady Knightsbridge went down, down went Kicklebury. Milliken and
his wife stayed, and were ill together on deck. A palm of glory ought to
be awarded to that man for his angelic patience, energy, and suffering.
It was he who went for Mrs. Milliken's maid, who wouldn't come to
her mistress; it was he, the shyest of men, who stormed the ladies'
cabin--that maritime harem--in order to get her mother's bottle of
salts; it was he who went for the brandy-and-water, and begged,
and prayed, and besought his adored Lavinia to taste a leetle drop.
Lavinia's reply was, "Don't--go away--don't tease, Horace," and so
forth. And, when not wanted, the gentle creature subsided on the bench,
by his wife's feet, and was sick in silence.
[Mem--In married life, it seems to me, that it is almost always Milliken
and wife, or just the contrary. The angels minister to the tyrants; or
the gentle, hen-pecked husband cowers before the superior partlet. If
ever I marry, I know the sort of woman I will choose; and I won't try
her temper by over-indulgence, and destroy her fine qualities by a
ruinous subserviency to her wishes.]
Little Miss Fanny stayed on deck, as well as her sister, and looked at
the stars of heaven, as they began to shine there, and at the Foreland
lights as we passed them. I would have talked with her; I would
have suggested images of poesy, and thoughts of beauty; I would have
whispered the word of sentiment--the delicate allusion--the breathing
of the soul that longs to find a congenial heart--the sorrows and
aspirations of the wounded spirit, stricken and sad, yet not QUITE
despairing; still knowing that the hope-plant lurked in its crushed
ruins--still able to gaze on the stars and the ocean, and love their
blazing sheen, their boundless azure. I would, I say, have taken the
opportunity of that stilly night to lay bare to her the treasures of a
heart that, I am happy to say, is young still; but circumstances forbade
the frank outpouring of my poet soul: in a word, I was obliged to go and
lie down on the flat of my back, and endeavor to control OTHER emotions
which struggled in my breast.
Once, in the night-watches, I arose, and came on deck; the vessel was
not, methought, pitching much; and yet--and yet Neptune was inexorable.
The placid stars looked down, but they gave me no peace. Lavinia
Milliken seemed asleep, and her Horace, in a death-like torpor, was
huddled at her feet. Miss Fanny had quitted the larboard side of
the ship, and had gone to starboard; and I thought that there was a
gentleman beside her; but I could not see very clearly, and returned
to the horrid crib, where Lankin was asleep, and the German fiddler
underneath him was snoring like his own violoncello.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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