Burlesques Part 20

"'Faix, Mam,' says the man, a Hirishman, 'and the divvle a babby have I seen this day except thirteen of my own--and you're welcome to any one of THEM, and kindly.'

"'As if HIS babby was equal to ours,' as my darling Mary Hann said, afterwards. All the station was scrouging round us by this time--pawters & clarx and refreshmint people and all. 'What's this year row about that there babby?' at last says the Inspector, stepping hup. I thought my wife was going to jump into his harms. 'Have you got him?' says she.

"'Was it a child in a blue cloak?' says he.

"'And blue eyse!' says my wife.

"'I put a label on him and sent him on to Bristol; he's there by this time. The Guard of the Mail took him and put him into a letter-box,'

says he: 'he went 20 minutes ago. We found him on the broad gauge line, and sent him on by it, in course,' says he. 'And it'll be a caution to you, young woman, for the future, to label your children along with the rest of your luggage.'

"If my piguniary means had been such as ONCE they was, you may emadgine I'd have ad a speshle train and been hoff like smoak. As it was, we was obliged to wait 4 mortial hours for the next train (4 ears they seemed to us), and then away we went.

"'My boy! my little boy!' says poor choking Mary Hann, when we got there. 'A parcel in a blue cloak?' says the man. 'No body claimed him here, and so we sent him back by the mail. An Irish nurse here gave him some supper, and he's at Paddington by this time. Yes,' says he, looking at the clock, 'he's been there these ten minutes.'

"But seeing my poor wife's distracted histarricle state, this good-naterd man says, 'I think, my dear, there's a way to ease your mind. We'll know in five minutes how he is.'

"'Sir,' says she, 'don't make sport of me.'

"'No, my dear, we'll TELEGRAPH him.'

"And he began hopparating on that singlar and ingenus elecktricle inwention, which aniliates time, and carries intellagence in the twinkling of a peg-post.

"'I'll ask,' says he, 'for child marked G. W. 273.'

"Back comes the telegraph with the sign, 'All right.'

"'Ask what he's doing, sir,' says my wife, quite amazed. Back comes the answer in a Jiffy--

"'C. R. Y. I. N. G.'

"This caused all the bystanders to laugh excep my pore Mary Hann, who pull'd a very sad face.

"The good-naterd feller presently said, 'he'd have another trile;' and what d'ye think was the answer? I'm blest if it wasn't--

"'P. A. P.'

"He was eating pap! There's for you--there's a rogue for you--there's a March of Intaleck! Mary Hann smiled now for the fust time. 'He'll sleep now,' says she. And she sat down with a full hart.

"If hever that good-naterd Shooperintendent comes to London, HE need never ask for his skore at the 'Wheel of Fortune Otel,' I promise you--where me and my wife and James Hangelo now is; and where only yesterday a gent came in and drew this pictur* of us in our bar.

* This refers to an ill.u.s.trated edition of the work.

"And if they go on breaking gages; and if the child, the most precious luggidge of the Henglishman, is to be bundled about this year way, why it won't be for want of warning, both from Professor Harris, the Commission, and from

"My dear Mr. Punch's obeajent servant,

"JEAMES PLUSH."

THE TREMENDOUS ADVENTURES OF MAJOR GAHAGAN.

CHAPTER I.

"TRUTH IS STRANGE, STRANGER THAN FICTION."

I think it but right that in making my appearance before the public I should at once acquaint them with my t.i.tles and name. My card, as I leave it at the houses of the n.o.bility, my friends, is as follows:--

MAJOR GOLIAH O'GRADY GAHAGAN, H.E.I.C.S.,

Commanding Battalion of Irregular Horse,

AHMEDNUGGAR.

Seeing, I say, this simple visiting ticket, the world will avoid any of those awkward mistakes as to my person, which have been so frequent of late. There has been no end to the blunders regarding this humble t.i.tle of mine, and the confusion thereby created. When I published my volume of poems, for instance, the Morning Post newspaper remarked "that the Lyrics of the Heart, by Miss Gahagan, may be ranked among the sweetest flowrets of the present spring season." The Quarterly Review, commenting upon my Observations on the "Pons Asinorum" (4to. London, 1836), called me "Doctor Gahagan," and so on. It was time to put an end to these mistakes, and I have taken the above simple remedy.

I was urged to it by a very exalted personage. Dining in August last at the palace of the T-lr-es at Paris, the lovely young Duch-ss of Orl--ns (who, though she does not speak English, understands it as well as I do,) said to me in the softest Teutonic, "Lieber Herr Major, haben sie den Ahmednuggarischen-jager-battalion gela.s.sen?" "Warum denn?" said I, quite astonished at her R---l H-----ss's question. The P---cess then spoke of some trifle from my pen, which was simply signed Goliah Gahagan.

There was, unluckily, a dead silence as H. R. H. put this question.

"Comment donc?" said H. M. Lo-is Ph-l-ppe, looking gravely at Count Mole; "le cher Major a quitte l'armee! Nicolas donc sera maitre de l'Inde!" H. M---- and the Pr. M-n-ster pursued their conversation in a low tone, and left me, as may be imagined in a dreadful state of confusion. I blushed and stuttered, and murmured out a few incoherent words to explain--but it would not do--I could not recover my equanimity during the course of the dinner and while endeavoring to help an English Duke, my neighbor, to poulet a l'Austerlitz, fairly sent seven mushrooms and three large greasy croutes over his whiskers and s.h.i.+rt-frill.

Another laugh at my expense. "Ah! M. le Major," said the Q---- of the B-lg--ns, archly, "vous n'aurez jamais votre brevet de Colonel." Her M----y's joke will be better understood when I state that his Grace is the brother of a Minister.

I am not at liberty to violate the sanct.i.ty of private life, by mentioning the names of the parties concerned in this little anecdote. I only wish to have it understood that I am a gentleman, and live at least in DECENT society. Verb.u.m sat.

But to be serious. I am obliged always to write the name of Goliah in full, to distinguish me from my brother, Gregory Gahagan, who was also a Major (in the King's service), and whom I killed in a duel, as the public most likely knows. Poor Greg! a very trivial dispute was the cause of our quarrel, which never would have originated but for the similarity of our names. The circ.u.mstance was this: I had been lucky enough to render the Nawaub of Lucknow some trifling service (in the notorious affair of Choprasjee Muckjee), and his Highness sent down a gold toothpick-case directed to Captain G. Gahagan, which I of course thought was for me: my brother madly claimed it; we fought, and the consequence was, that in about three minutes he received a slash in the right side (cut 6), which effectually did his business:--he was a good swordsman enough--I was THE BEST in the universe. The most ridiculous part of the affair is, that the toothpick-case was his, after all--he had left it on the Nawaub's table at tiffin. I can't conceive what madness prompted him to fight about such a paltry bauble; he had much better have yielded it at once, when he saw I was determined to have it. From this slight specimen of my adventures, the reader will perceive that my life has been one of no ordinary interest; and, in fact, I may say that I have led a more remarkable life than any man in the service--I have been at more pitched battles, led more forlorn hopes, had more success among the fair s.e.x, drunk harder, read more, and been a handsomer man than any officer now serving her Majesty.

When I at first went to India in 1802, I was a raw cornet of seventeen, with blazing red hair, six feet four in height, athletic at all kinds of exercises, owing money to my tailor and everybody else who would trust me, possessing an Irish brogue, and my full pay of 120L. a year. I need not say that with all these advantages I did that which a number of clever fellows have done before me--I fell in love, and proposed to marry immediately.

But how to overcome the difficulty?--It is true that I loved Julia Jowler--loved her to madness; but her father intended her for a Member of Council at least, and not for a beggarly Irish ensign. It was, however, my fate to make the pa.s.sage to India (on board of the "Samuel Sn.o.b" East Indiaman, Captain Duffy,) with this lovely creature, and my misfortune instantaneously to fall in love with her. We were not out of the Channel before I adored her, wors.h.i.+pped the deck which she trod upon, kissed a thousand times the cuddy-chair on which she used to sit.

The same madness fell on every man in the s.h.i.+p. The two mates fought about her at the Cape; the surgeon, a sober, pious Scotchman, from disappointed affection, took so dreadfully to drinking as to threaten spontaneous combustion; and old Colonel Lilywhite, carrying his wife and seven daughters to Bengal, swore that he would have a divorce from Mrs.

L., and made an attempt at suicide; the captain himself told me, with tears in his eyes, that he hated his. .h.i.therto-adored Mrs. Duffy, although he had had nineteen children by her.

We used to call her the witch--there was magic in her beauty and in her voice. I was spell-bound when I looked at her, and stark staring mad when she looked at me! O l.u.s.trous black eyes!--O glossy night-black ringlets!--O lips!--O dainty frocks of white muslin!--O tiny kid slippers!--though old and gouty, Gahagan sees you still! I recollect, off Ascension, she looked at me in her particular way one day at dinner, just as I happened to be blowing on a piece of scalding hot green fat.

I was stupefied at once--I thrust the entire morsel (about half a pound) into my mouth. I made no attempt to swallow, or to masticate it, but left it there for many minutes, burning, burning! I had no skin to my palate for seven weeks after, and lived on rice-water during the rest of the voyage. The anecdote is trivial, but it shows the power of Julia Jowler over me.

The writers of marine novels have so exhausted the subject of storms, s.h.i.+pwrecks, mutinies, engagements, sea-sickness, and so forth, that (although I have experienced each of these in many varieties) I think it quite unnecessary to recount such trifling adventures; suffice it to say, that during our five months' trajet, my mad pa.s.sion for Julia daily increased; so did the captain's and the surgeon's; so did Colonel Lilywhite's; so did the doctor's, the mate's--that of most part of the pa.s.sengers, and a considerable number of the crew. For myself, I swore--ensign as I was--I would win her for my wife; I vowed that I would make her glorious with my sword--that as soon as I had made a favorable impression on my commanding officer (which I did not doubt to create), I would lay open to him the state of my affections, and demand his daughter's hand. With such sentimental outpourings did our voyage continue and conclude.

We landed at the Sunderbunds on a grilling hot day in December, 1802, and then for the moment Julia and I separated. She was carried off to her papa's arms in a palanquin, surrounded by at least forty hookahbadars; whilst the poor cornet, attended but by two dandies and a solitary beasty (by which unnatural name these blackamoors are called), made his way humbly to join the regiment at head-quarters.

The --th Regiment of Bengal Cavalry, then under the command of Lieut.-Colonel Julius Jowler, C.B., was known throughout Asia and Europe by the proud t.i.tle of the Bundelcund Invincibles--so great was its character for bravery, so remarkable were its services in that delightful district of India. Major Sir George Gutch was next in command, and Tom Thrupp, as kind a fellow as ever ran a Mahratta through the body, was second Major. We were on the eve of that remarkable war which was speedily to spread throughout the whole of India, to call forth the valor of a Wellesley, and the indomitable gallantry of a Gahagan; which was ill.u.s.trated by our victories at Ahmednuggar (where I was the first over the barricade at the storming of the Pettah); at Argaum, where I slew with my own sword twenty-three matchlock-men, and cut a dromedary in two; and by that terrible day of a.s.saye, where Wellesley would have been beaten but for me--me alone: I headed nineteen charges of cavalry, took (aided by only four men of my own troop) seventeen field-pieces, killing the scoundrelly French artillerymen; on that day I had eleven elephants shot under me, and carried away Scindiah's nose-ring with a pistol-ball. Wellesley is a Duke and a Marshal, I but a simple Major of Irregulars. Such is fortune and war!

But my feelings carry me away from my narrative, which had better proceed with more order.