Mrs. Caudle's Curtain Lectures Part 3

LECTURE VII--MR. CAUDLE HAS VENTURED A REMONSTRANCE ON HIS DAY'S DINNER: COLD MUTTON, AND NO PUDDING.--MRS. CAUDLE DEFENDS THE COLD SHOULDER

"Umph! I'm sure! Well! I wonder what it will be next? There's nothing proper, now--nothing at all. Better get somebody else to keep the house, I think. I can't do it now, it seems; I'm only in the way here: I'd better take the children, and go.

"What am I grumbling about now? It's very well for you to ask that!

I'm sure I'd better be out of the world than--there now, Mr. Caudle; there you are again! I SHALL speak, sir. It isn't often I open my mouth, Heaven knows! But you like to hear n.o.body talk but yourself.

You ought to have married a negro slave, and not any respectable woman.

"You're to go about the house looking like thunder all the day, and I'm not to say a word. Where do you think pudding's to come from every day? You show a nice example to your children, you do; complaining, and turning your nose up at a sweet piece of cold mutton, because there's no pudding! You go a nice way to make 'em extravagant--teach 'em nice lessons to begin the world with. Do you know what puddings cost; or do you think they fly in at the window?

"You hate cold mutton. The more shame for you, Mr. Caudle. I'm sure you've the stomach of a lord, you have. No, sir: I didn't choose to hash the mutton. It's very easy for you to say hash it; but _I_ know what a joint loses in has.h.i.+ng: it's a day's dinner the less, if it's a bit. Yes, I daresay; other people may have puddings with cold mutton. No doubt of it; and other people become bankrupts. But if ever you get into the Gazette, it sha'n't be MY fault--no; I'll do my duty as a wife to you, Mr. Caudle: you shall never have it to say that it was MY housekeeping that brought you to beggary. No; you may sulk at the cold meat--ha! I hope you'll never live to want such a piece of cold mutton as we had to-day! and you may threaten to go to a tavern to dine; but, with our present means, not a crumb of pudding do you get from me. You shall have nothing but the cold joint-- nothing as I'm a Christian sinner.

"Yes; there you are, throwing those fowls in my face again! I know you once brought home a pair of fowls; I know it: and weren't you mean enough to want to stop 'em out of my week's money? Oh, the selfishness--the shabbiness of men! They can go out and throw away pounds upon pounds with a pack of people who laugh at 'em afterwards; but if it's anything wanted for their own homes, their poor wives may hunt for it. I wonder you don't blush to name those fowls again! I wouldn't be so little for the world, Mr. Caudle.

"What are you going to do?

"GOING TO GET UP?

"Don't make yourself ridiculous, Mr. Caudle; I can't say a word to you like any other wife, but you must threaten to get up. DO be ashamed of yourself.

"Puddings, indeed! Do you think I'm made of puddings? Didn't you have some boiled rice three weeks ago? Besides, is this the time of the year for puddings? It's all very well if I had money enough allowed me like any other wife to keep the house with: then, indeed, I might have preserves like any other woman; now, it's impossible; and it's cruel--yes, Mr. Caudle, cruel--of you to expect it.

"APPLES AREN'T SO DEAR, ARE THEY?

"I know what apples are, Mr. Caudle, without your telling me. But I suppose you want something more than apples for dumplings? I suppose sugar costs something, doesn't it? And that's how it is. That's how one expense brings on another, and that's how people go to ruin.

"PANCAKES?

"What's the use of your lying muttering there about pancakes? Don't you always have 'em once a year--every Shrove Tuesday? And what would any moderate, decent man want more?

"Pancakes, indeed! Pray, Mr. Caudle,--no, it's no use your saying fine words to me to let you go to sleep; I sha'n't!--pray do you know the price of eggs just now? There's not an egg you can trust to under seven and eight a s.h.i.+lling; well, you've only just to reckon up how many eggs--don't lie swearing there at the eggs in that manner, Mr. Caudle; unless you expect the bed to let you fall through. You call yourself a respectable tradesman, I suppose? Ha! I only wish people knew you as well as I do! Swearing at eggs, indeed! But I'm tired of this usage, Mr. Caudle; quite tired of it; and I don't care how soon it's ended!

"I'm sure I do nothing but work and labour, and think how to make the most of everything; and this is how I'm rewarded. I should like to see anybody whose joints go further than mine. But if I was to throw away your money into the street, or lay it out in fine feathers on myself, I should be better thought of. The woman who studies her husband and her family is always made a drudge of. It's your fine fal-lal wives who've the best time of it.

"What's the use of your lying groaning there in that manner? That won't make me hold my tongue, I can tell you. You think to have it all your own way--but you won't, Mr. Caudle! You can insult my dinner; look like a demon, I may say, at a wholesome piece of cold mutton--ah! the thousands of far better creatures than you are who'd been thankful for that mutton!--and I'm never to speak! But you're mistaken--I will. Your usage of me, Mr. Caudle, is infamous-- unworthy of a man. I only wish people knew you for what you are; but I've told you again and again they shall some day.

"Puddings! And now I suppose I shall hear of nothing but puddings!

Yes, and I know what it would end in. First, you'd have a pudding every day--oh, I know your extravagance--then you'd go for fish,-- then I shouldn't wonder if you'd have soup; turtle, no doubt: then you'd go for a dessert; and--oh! I see it all as plain as the quilt before me--but no, not while I'm alive! What your second wife may do I don't know; perhaps SHE'LL be a fine lady; but you sha'n't be ruined by me, Mr. Caudle; that I'm determined. Puddings, indeed!

Pu-dding-s! Pud--"

"Exhausted nature," says Caudle, "could hold out no longer. She went to sleep."

LECTURE VIII--CAUDLE HAS BEEN MADE A MASON--MRS. CAUDLE INDIGNANT AND CURIOUS

"Now, Mr. Caudle--Mr. Caudle, I say: oh: you can't be asleep already, I know now, what I mean to say is this; there's no use, none at all, in our having any disturbance about the matter; but, at last my mind's made up, Mr. Caudle; I shall leave you. Either I know all you've been doing to-night, or to-morrow morning I quit the house.

No, no; there's an end of the marriage state, I think--an end of all confidence between man and wife--if a husband's to have secrets and keep 'em all to himself. Pretty secrets they must be, when his own wife can't know 'em! Not fit for any decent person to know, I'm sure, if that's the case. Now, Caudle, don't let us quarrel, there's a good soul, tell me what it's all about? A pack of nonsense, I dare say; still--not that I care much about it,--still I SHOULD like to know. There's a dear. Eh: oh, don't tell me there's nothing in it: I know better. I'm not a fool, Mr. Caudle: I know there's a good deal in it. Now, Caudle, just tell me a little bit of it. I'm sure I'd tell you anything. You know I would. Well?

"Caudle, you're enough to vex a saint! Now don't you think you're going to sleep; because you're not. Do you suppose I'd ever suffered you to go and be made a mason, if I didn't suppose I was to know the secret too? Not that it's anything to know, I dare say; and that's why I'm determined to know it.

"But I know what it is; oh yes, there can be no doubt. The secret is, to ill-use poor women; to tyrannise over 'em; to make 'em your slaves: especially your wives. It must be something of the sort, or you wouldn't be ashamed to have it known. What's right and proper never need be done in secret. It's an insult to a woman for a man to be a freemason, and let his wife know nothing of it. But, poor soul!

she's sure to know it somehow--for nice husbands they all make. Yes, yes; a part of the secret is to think better of all the world than their own wives and families. I'm sure men have quite enough to care for--that is, if they act properly--to care for them they have at home. They can't have much care to spare for the world besides.

"And I suppose they call you BROTHER Caudle? A pretty brother, indeed! Going and dressing yourself up in an ap.r.o.n like a turnpike man--for that's what you look like. And I should like to know what the ap.r.o.n's for? There must be something in it not very respectable, I'm sure. Well, I only wish I was Queen for a day or two. I'd put an end to freemasonry, and all such trumpery, I know.

"Now, come, Caudle; don't let's quarrel. Eh! You're not in pain, dear? What's it all about? What are you lying laughing there at?

But I'm a fool to trouble my head about you.

"And you're not going to let me know the secret, eh? You mean to say,--you're not? Now, Caudle, you know it's a hard matter to put me in a pa.s.sion--not that I care about the secret itself: no, I wouldn't give a b.u.t.ton to know it, for it's all nonsense, I'm sure.

It isn't the secret I care about: it's the slight, Mr. Caudle; it's the studied insult that a man pays to his wife, when he thinks of going through the world keeping something to himself which he won't let her know. Man and wife one, indeed! I should like to know how that can be when a man's a mason--when he keeps a secret that sets him and his wife apart? Ha, you men make the laws, and so you take good care to have all the best of 'em to yourselves: otherwise a woman ought to be allowed a divorce when a man becomes a mason: when he's got a sort of corner-cupboard in his heart--a secret place in his mind--that his poor wife isn't allowed to rummage!

"Caudle, you sha'n't close your eyes for a week--no, you sha'n't-- unless you tell me some of it. Come, there's a good creature; there's a love. I'm sure, Caudle, I wouldn't refuse you anything-- and you know it, or ought to know it by this time. I only wish I had a secret! To whom should I think of confiding it, but to my dear husband? I should be miserable to keep it to myself, and you know it. Now Caudle?

"Was there ever such a man? A man, indeed! A brute!--yes, Mr.

Caudle, an unfeeling, brutal creature, when you might oblige me, and you won't. I'm sure I don't object to your being a mason: not at all, Caudle; I dare say it's a very good thing; I dare say it is-- it's only your making a secret of it that vexes me. But you'll tell me--you'll tell your own Margaret? You won't! You're a wretch, Mr.

Caudle.

"But I know why: oh, yes, I can tell. The fact is, you're ashamed to let me know what a fool they've been making of you. That's it.

You, at your time of life--the father of a family! I should be ashamed of myself, Caudle.

"And I suppose you'll be going to what you call your Lodge every night, now. Lodge, indeed! Pretty place it must be, where they don't admit women. Nice goings on, I dare say. Then you call one another brethren. Brethren! I'm sure you'd relations enough, you didn't want any more.

"But I know what all this masonry's about. It's only an excuse to get away from your wives and families, that you may feast and drink together, that's all. That's the secret. And to abuse women,--as if they were inferior animals, and not to be trusted. That's the secret; and nothing else.

"Now, Caudle, don't let us quarrel. Yes, I know you're in pain.

Still, Caudle, my love; Caudle! Dearest, I say! Caudle!"

"I recollect nothing more," says Caudle, "for I had eaten a hearty supper, and somehow became oblivious."

LECTURE IX--MR. CAUDLE HAS BEEN TO GREENWICH FAIR

"Ho, Mr. Caudle: I hope you enjoyed yourself at Greenwich.

"HOW DO I KNOW YOU'VE BEEN AT GREENWICH?

"I know it very well, sir: know all about it: know more than you think I know. I thought there was something in the wind. Yes, I was sure of it, when you went out of the house to-day. I knew it by the looks of you, though I didn't say anything. Upon my word! And you call yourself a respectable man, and the father of a family! Going to a fair among all sorts of people,--at your time of life. Yes; and never think of taking your wife with you. Oh no! you can go and enjoy yourself out, with I don't know who: go out, and make yourself very pleasant, I dare say. Don't tell me; I hear what a nice companion Mr. Caudle is: what a good-tempered person. Ha! I only wish people could see you at home, that's all. But so it is with men. They can keep all their good temper for out-of-doors--their wives never see any of it. Oh dear! I'm sure I don't know who'd be a poor woman!

"Now, Caudle, I'm not in an ill-temper; not at all. I know I used to be a fool when we were first married: I used to worry and fret myself to death when you went out; but I've got over that. I wouldn't put myself out of the way now for the best man that ever trod. For what thanks does a poor woman get? None at all. No: it's those who don't care for their families who are the best thought of. I only wish I could bring myself not to care for mine.