The Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. YellowplushThackeray, William Makepeace
General
The Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush
Thackeray, William Makepeace
Didactic fiction; England -- Fiction; Household employees -- Fiction; Humorous stories; Master and servant -- Fiction
“Hark ye,” says he, “my gossoon, doan't be led asthray by the nonsinse
of that divil of a Bullwig. He's jillous of ye, my bhoy: that's the
rale, undoubted thruth; and it's only to keep you out of litherary
life that he's palavering you in this way. I'll tell you what--Plush ye
blackguard,--my honorable frind the mimber there has told me a hunder
times by the smallest computation, of his intense admiration of your
talents, and the wonderful sthir they were making in the world. He can't
bear a rival. He's mad with envy, hatred, oncharatableness. Look at
him, Plush, and look at me. My father was not a juke exactly, nor aven
a markis, and see, nevertheliss, to what a pitch I am come. I spare no
ixpinse; I'm the iditor of a cople of pariodicals; I dthrive about in me
carridge: I dine wid the lords of the land; and why--in the name of the
piper that pleed before Mosus, hwy? Because I'm a litherary man. Because
I know how to play me cards. Because I'm Docther Larner, in fact, and
mimber of every society in and out of Europe. I might have remained
all my life in Thrinity Colledge, and never made such an incom as that
offered you by Sir Jan; but I came to London--to London, my boy, and now
see! Look again at me friend Bullwig. He IS a gentleman, to be sure, and
bad luck to 'im, say I; and what has been the result of his litherary
labor? I'll tell you what; and I'll tell this gintale society, by the
shade of Saint Patrick, they're going to make him a BARINET.”
“A BARNET, Doctor!” says I; “you don't mean to say they're going to make
him a barnet!”
“As sure as I've made meself a docthor,” says Larner.
“What, a baronet, like Sir John?”
“The divle a bit else.”
“And pray what for?”
“What faw?” says Bullwig. “Ask the histowy of litwatuwe what faw? Ask
Colburn, ask Bentley, ask Saunders and Otley, ask the gweat Bwitish
nation, what faw? The blood in my veins comes puwified thwough ten
thousand years of chivalwous ancestwy; but that is neither here
nor there: my political principles--the equal wights which I have
advocated--the gweat cause of fweedom that I have celebwated, are known
to all. But this, I confess, has nothing to do with the question. No,
the question is this--on the thwone of litewature I stand unwivalled,
pwe-eminent; and the Bwitish government, honowing genius in me,
compliments the Bwitish nation by lifting into the bosom of the
heweditawy nobility, the most gifted member of the democwacy.” (The
honrabble genlm here sunk down amidst repeated cheers.)
“Sir John,” says I, “and my lord duke, the words of my rivrint frend
Ignatius, and the remarks of the honrabble genlmn who has just sate
down, have made me change the detummination which I had the honor of
igspressing just now.
“I igsept the eighty pound a year; knowing that I shall ave plenty of
time for pursuing my littery career, and hoping some day to set on that
same bentch of barranites, which is deckarated by the presnts of my
honrabble friend.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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