"I do, my lord," said he, with benignant _hauteur._ "It appears every month--_The Polytechnic."_
"I thought so! you are polysyllabic, Saunders; _en route!"_
~ "In this hallucination I find it difficult to participate; associated from infancy with the aristocracy, I shrink, like the sensitive plant, from contact with anything vulgar."
~ "I see! I begin to understand you, Saunders. Order the dog-cart, and Wordsworth's mare for leader; we'll give her a trial. You are an ass, Saunders."
"Yes, my lord; I will order Robert to tell James to come for your lordship's commands about your lordship's vehicles. (What could he intend by a recent observation of a discourteous character?)"
His lordship soliloquized.
"I never observed it before, but Saunders is an ass! La Johnstone is one of Nature's duchesses, and she has made me know some poor people that will be richer than the rich one day; and she has taught me that honey is to be got from bank-notes--by merely giving them away."
Among the objects of charity Lord Ipsden discovered was one Thomas Harvey, a maker and player of the violin. This man was a person of great intellect; he mastered every subject he attacked. By a careful examination of all the points that various fine-toned instruments had in common, he had arrived at a theory of sound; he made violins to correspond, and was remarkably successful in insuring that which had been too hastily ascribed to accident--a fine tone.
This man, who was in needy circumstances, demonstrated to his lordship that ten pounds would make his fortune; because with ten pounds he could set up a shop, instead of working out of the world's sight in a room.
Lord Ipsden gave him ten pounds!
A week after, he met Harvey, more ragged and dirty than before.
Harvey had been robbed by a friend whom he had assisted. Poor Harvey!
Lord Ipsden gave him ten pounds more!
Next week, Saunders, entering Harvey's house, found him in bed at noon, because he had no clothes to wear.
Saunders suggested that it would be better to give his wife the next money, with strict orders to apply it usefully.
This was done!
The next day, Harvey, finding his clothes upon a chair, his tools redeemed from pawn, and a beefsteak ready for his dinner, accused his wife of having money, and meanly refusing him the benefit of it. She acknowledged she had a little, and appealed to the improved state of things as a proof that she knew better than he the use of money. He demanded the said money. She refused--he leathered her--she put him in prison.
This was the best place for him. The man was a drunkard, and all the riches of Egypt would never have made him better off.
And here, gentlemen of the lower classes, a word with you. How can you, with your small incomes, hope to be well off, if you are more extravagant than those who have large ones?
"Us extravagant?" you reply.
Yes! your income is ten shillings a week; out of that you spend three shillings in drink; ay! you, the sober ones. You can't afford it, my boys. Find me a man whose income is a thousand a year; well, if he imitates you, and spends three hundred upon sensuality, I bet you the odd seven hundred he does not make both ends meet; the proportion is too great. And _two-thirds of the distress of the lower orders is owing to this--that they are more madly prodigal than the rich; in the worst, lowest and most dangerous item of all human prodigality!_
Lord Ipsden went to see Mrs. Harvey; it cost him much to go; she lived in the Old Town, and he hated disagreeable smells; he also knew from Saunders that she had two black eyes, and he hated women with black eyes of that sort. But this good creature did go; did relieve Mrs. Harvey; and, bare-headed, suffered himself to be bedewed ten minutes by her tearful twaddle.
For once Virtue was rewarded. Returning over the North Bridge, he met somebody whom but for his charity he would not have met.
He came in one bright moment plump upon--Lady Barbara Sinclair. She flushed, he trembled, and in two minutes he had forgotten every human event that had passed since he was by her side.
She seemed pleased to see him, too; she ignored entirely his obnoxious proposal; he wisely took her cue, and so, on this secret understanding, they were friends. He made his arrangements, and dined with her family.
It was a family party. In the evening Lady Barbara allowed it to transpire that she had made inquiries about him.
(He was highly flattered.) And she had discovered he was lying hid somewhere in the neighborhood.
"Studying the guitar?" inquired she.
"No," said he, "studying a new class of the community. Do you know any of what they call the 'lower classes'?"
"Yes."
"Monstrous agreeable people, are they not?"
"No, very stupid! I only know two old women--except the servants, who have no characters. They imitate us, I suspect, which does not say much for their taste."
"But some of my friends are young women; that makes all the difference."
"It does! and you ought to be ashamed. If you want a low order of mind, why desert our own circle?"
"My friends are only low in station; they have rather lofty minds, some of them."
