^) Jw a I E) RARY OF THE U N I VE.RSITY or ILLINOIS Yev-e V.I LAND AT LAST. LONDON: EOBSOi; A.KD SOX, GREAT NORTHERN PRINTING WORKS, PANCUAS ROAD, N.W. LAND AT LAST. IN THREE BOOKS. BY EDMUND YATES, AUTHOR OP " BROKEN TO HARNESS," " RIIN-NING THE GAUNTLET,' ETC. "Post tenebras luz." BOOK I.— iHafting for ^l^ote. LONDON: CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193 PICCADILLY. MDCCCLXVI. lAU rights reserved.'] ^ ^ r^ yzjX V. 1 CD oo CVi u:) 2^ "■v — T° QC ^ S; yVlY W J IFE, Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://www.archive.org/details/landatlastnovel01yate CONTENTS OF BOOK I CHAP. PAGE I. In the Streets 1 II. The Bretheen of the Brush .... 13 III. Blotted out 39 IV. Ox THE Door-step 59 V. The Letter 76 VI. The First Visit 97 VII. Chez Potts 119 VIII. Throwing the Fly 140 IX. Sunshine in the Shade 159 X. Your William 186 XI. Playing the Fish 210 XII. Under the Harrow 225 XIII. At the Private View 2-14 XIV. Those Twain One Flesh 274 LAND AT LAST. §00h tijc iirst. CHAPTER I. IN THE STREETS. It was between nine and ten o'clock on a January night, and the London streets were in a state of slush. During the previous night snow had fallen heavily, and the respectable portion of the com- munity, which, according to regular custom, had retired to bed at eleven o'clock, had been asto- nished, on peering out from behind a corner of the window-curtain when they arose, to find the roads and tlie neighbouring housetops covered with a thick white incrustation. Tlie pavements were already showing dank dabs of footmarks, which even the snow then falling failed to fill up; and VOL. I. B 2 LA2TD AT LAST. tlie roadway speedily lost its winter-garment and became sticky with congealed mud. Then the snow ceased, and a sickly straggling bit of win- ter-sunlight, a mere j^arody on the real thing, half light and half warmth, came lurking out between the dun clouds ; and under its influence the black-specked covering of the roofs melted, and the water-pipes ran with cold black liquid filth. The pavement had given it up long ago, and resumed its normal winter state of sticky slippery grease — ^grease which clung to the boots and roused the wildest rage of foot-passengers b}^ causing them to slip backward when they wanted to make progress, and which accumu- lated in the direst manner on the landing-places and street-corners, — the first bits of refuge after the perils of the crossing, — where it heaped itself in aggrava-ting lumps and shiny rings under the heels of foot-passengers just arrived, having been shaken and stamped off the soles of passengers who had just preceded them. So it had con- tinued all day; but towards the afternoon tlie air had grown colder, and a wliisper had rim IN THE STREETS. d round that it froze ao-aiii. Cutlers who had been gazing with a melancholy air on the placards *^^ Skates" in their window, and had determined on removing them, as a bad joke against them- selves, decided on letting them remain. Boys who had been delighted in the morning at the Bight of the snow, and proportionately chopfallen towards middle-day at the sight of the thaw, had plucked up again and seen visions of snowballing matches, slides on the gutters, and, most delicious of all, omnibus-horses both down at once on the slippery road. Homeward-bound City -clerks, iheir day's work over, shivered in the omnibuses, and told each other how they were afraid it had come at last, and reminded each other of what the newspapers had said about the flocks of wild- geese and other signs of a hard winter, and moaned lugubriously about the advanced price of coals and the difficulties of locomotion certain to be conse- quent on the frost. But when the cruel black niMit had set reofu- larly in, a dim sleek soft drizzle began to fall, and xill hopes or fears of frost were at an end. Slowly 4: LAND AT LAST. and gently it came doA\ai, wrapping the streets as with a damp pall; stealing quietly in under um- brellas ; eating its way through the thickest broad- cloth, matting the hair and hanging in dank, un- wholesome beads on the beards of all unlucky enough to be exposed to it. It meant mischief, this drizzle, and it carried out its intention. Om- nibus-drivers and cabmen knew it at once from long experience, donned their hea\y tarpaulin- capes, and made up their minds for the worst. The professional beggars knew it too. Tlie pave- ment-chalking tramp, who had selected a tolerably dry s2)ot under the lee of a wall, no sooner felt its first damp breath than he blew out his paper- lantern, put the candle into his pocket, stamped out as much of the mackerel and the ship at sea as he had already stencilled, and made off. The man in the exemplary shirt-collar and apron, who had planted himself before the chemist's window to procm-e an extra death-tinge from the light re- flected from the blue bottle, packed up his linen and decamped, fearing lest his stock-in-trade — his virtue and his lucifers — might be injm'ed by m THE STREETS. damp. The brass bands wliicli bad been playing outside the public-houses shouldered their instru- ments and went inside ; the vendors of second- hand books covered their openly-displayed stock with strips of baize and dismissed their watchful boys, conscious that no petty thief would risk the weather for so small a prey. The hot-potato men blew fiercer jets of steam out of their tin kitchens, as though calling on the public to defy dull care and comfort themselves with an antidote to the general wretchedness ; and the policemen stamped solemnly and slowly romid their beats, as men im- pressed with the full knowledge that, as there was not the remotest chance of their being relieved from their miserable fate until the morning, they micrht as well bear themselves with as much dis:- nity as possible under the circumstances. It was bad every where; but in no place at the West-end of London was it so bad as at the Eegent Circus. There the great tide of humanity had been ebbing and flowing all day ; there hap- less females in shoals had struggled across the roaring sea of Oxford Street, some conveyed by 6 LAND AT LAST. the crossing - sweeper, some drifting helplessly under the poles of omnibvises and the wheels of hansom cabs. Tliere the umbrellas of the ex- pectant omnibus-seekers jostled each other with extra virulence ; and there the edges of the pave- ments were thick with dark alluvial deposits kicked hither and thither by the feet of thou- sands. All day there had been a bustle and a roar romid this spot; and at ten o'clock at night it had but little diminished. Omnibus-conductors, like kites and vultures, clawed and wrangled over the bodies of their victims, who in a miserable little flock huddled togetlier in a corner, and dashed out helplessly and without pm-pose as each lumbering vehicle drew up. Intermingled with these were several vagabond boys, whose animal spirits no amount of Avet or misery could quell, and who constituted themselves a kind of vedette or outpost-guard, giving warning of the approach of the different omnibuses in much plea- santly familiar speech, '^ aSTow, guv'nor, for Bays- water ! Hatlas comin' up ! Ready now for Not- tin' '111 !" IN THE STREETS. V At the back of the little crowd, sheltering her- self under the lee of the houses, stood a slight female figure, a mere slight slip of a girl, dressed only in a clinging gown and a miserable tightly- drawn shawl. Her worn bonnet was pulled over her face, her arms were clasped before her, and she stood in a doorway almost motionless. The policeman tramping leisurely by had at first ima- gined her to be an omnibus -passenger waiting for a vehicle ; but some twenty minutes after he had first noticed her, finding her still in the same position, he took advantage of a pretended trial of the security of various street-doors to scrutinise her appearance. To the man versed in such matters the miserable garb told its own tale — its wearer was a pauper ; and a beggar the man in office surmised, although the girl had made no plaint, had uttered no word, had remained im- movable and statue-like, gazing blankly before her. The policeman had been long enough in the force to know that the girl's presence in the doorway was an offence in the eyes of the law ; but he was a, kindly-hearted Somersetshire man, 8 LAND AT LAST. and lie performed his duty in as pleasant a way as he could, by gently pulling a corner of the drabbled shawl, and saying, " You mustn't stand here, lass ; you must move on, please." Tlie shawl-wearer never looked up or spoke, but shiv- ering slightly, stepped out into the dank mist, and floated, phantom-like, across the road. Gliding up the upper part of Regent Street, keeping close to the houses, and walking with her head bent down and her arms always folded tightly across her breast, she struck off into a bystreet to the right, and, crossing Oxford Market, seemed hesitating which way to turn. For an instant she stopped before the window of an eating-house, where thick columns of steam were yet playing round the attenuated remains of joints, or cast- ing a greasy halo round slabs of pudding. As the girl gazed at these wretched remnants of a wretched feast, she raised her head, her eyes glistened, her pinched nostrils dilated, and for an instant her breath came thick and fast; then, drawing her shawl more tightly round her, and bending her head to avoid as much as possible IN THE STREETS. 9 the rain, wliich came tliickly scudding on tlie rising wind, she hurried on, and only stopped for shelter under the outstretched blind of a little chandler's shop — a wretched shelter, for the blind was soaked through, and the rain dripped from it in little pools, and the wind shook it in its frame, and eddied underneath it with a wet and gusty whirl ; but there was something of comfort to the gh'l in the warm look of the gaslit shop, in the smug rotund appearance of the chandler, in the distant glimmer of the fire on the glazed door of the parlom- at the back. Staring vacantly before him while mechanically patting a conical lump of lard, not unlike the bald cranium of an elderly gentleman, the chandler became aware of the girl's face at the window; and seeing Want legibly inscribed by Nature's never-erring hand on every feature of that face, and being a hu- mane man, he was groping in the till for some small coin to bestow in charity, when from the back room came a sharp shrill voice, "Jim, time to shut up !" and at the sound of the voice the chandler hastily retreated, and, a small boy sud- 10 LAND AT LAST. denly appearing, pulled up the overlianglng blind, and having lost its shelter, the girl set forth again. But her course was nearly at an end. To avoid a troop of bovs who, arm-in-arm, came breasting up the street singing the burden of a negro-song, she turned oif again into the main thoroughfare, and had barely gained the broad shadow of the shar2:>-steepled church in Langham Place, when she felt her legs sinking under her, her brain reeling, her heart throbbing in her breast like a ball of fire. She tottered and clung to the church- railing for support. In the next instant she was smTounded by a little crowd, in which she had a vision of painted faces and glistening silks, a dream of faint words of commiseration overborne by mocking laughter and ribald oaths, oaths made more fearful still by being uttered in foreign ac- cents, of bitter jests and broad hints of dininken- ness and shame ; finally, of the strident voice of the policeman telling her again to "move on!" The dead faintness, consequent on cold and wet and weariness and starvation, passed away for the time, and she obeyed the mandate. Passively she IN THE STREETS. 11 crept away a few steps up a deserted bystreet until her tormentors had left her quite alone ; then she sunk down, shivering, on a door-step, and burying her face in her tattered shawl, felt that her end was come. There she remained, the dead damp cold striking thi'ough her lower limbs and chilling them to stone, while her head was one blazing fire. Gradually her limbs became numbed and lost to all sensation, ' a sickening empty pain was round her heart, a dead apathy setthng down over her mind and brain. The tramping of feet was close upon her, the noise of loud voices, the ringing shouts of loud laughter, were in her ears ; but she never raised her head from the tattered shawl, nor by speech or motion did she give the smallest sign of life. Men passed her constantly, all making for one goal, the portico next to that in which she had sunk down helpless — men vrith kindly hearts attuned to cha- rity, who, had they known the state of the wretched wayfarer, would have exerted themselves bravely in her succour, but wdiom a London life had so inured to spectacles of casual misery and vice, that a few 12 LAND AT LAST. only cast a passing glance on the stricken woman and passed on. They came singly and in twos and threes ; but none spoke to her, none noticed her save by a glance and a shoulder-shrug. Then, as the icy hands of Cold and Want gra- dually stealing over her seemed to settle round the region of her heart, the girl gave one low faint cry, ^^ God help me ! it's come at last — God help me !" and fell back in a dead swoon. CHAPTER 11. THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. The house to wlilcli all the jovial fellows who passed the girl on the doorstep with such carelessness were wending their way was almost unique in the metro- polis. The rumour ran that it had originally been designed for stables, and indeed there was a certain mews-ish appearance about its architectui-al eleva- tion; it had the squat, squabby, square look of those buildings from whose upper-floors clothes- lines stretch diagonally across stable-yards ; and you were at first surprised at finding an imposing portico with an imposing bell in a position where you looked for the folding-doors of a coach-house. AYhether there had been any truth in the report or not, it is certain that the owner of the property speedily saw his way to more money than he could have gained by the ignoble pursuit of stabling 14 LA^D AT LAST. horses, and made alterations in liis building which converted it into several sets of spacious, roomy, and comfortable, if not elegant chambers. Tlie upper rooms were duly let, and speedily became famous — thus-wise. When Parmegiano Wilkins made his first great success with his j^icture of ^^ Boadicea at Breakfast," — connoisseurs and art- critics will recollect the marvellous manner in which the chip in the porridge of the Queen of the Iceni was rendered, — Mr. Caniche, the great picture-dealer, to whom Wilkins had mortgaged himself body and soul for three years, felt it neces- sary that his next works should be submitted to the private inspection of the newspaper-writers and the cognoscenti previous to their going into the Academy Exhibition. On receiving a letter to this effect from Caniche, Wilkins was at his wits' end. He w^as living, for privacy's sake, in a little cot- tage on the outskirts of Epping Forest, and having made a success, had naturally alienated all liis friends whose rooms in town would otherwise have been available for the display of his pictures ; he thought— and there the astute pictui'e-dealer agreed THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 15 with lilm — that it would be unwise to send them to Caniche's sliop (it was before such places were called "galleries"), as tending to make public the connection between them; and Wilkins did not know what to do. Then Caniche came to his rescue. Little Jimmy Dabb, who had been Gold- Medallist and Travelling- Student at the Academy three years beforehand, and who, for sheer sake of bread-winning, had settled down as one of Caniche's labourers, had a big studio in the stable- like edifice near Langham Church. In it he painted those bits of domestic life, — dying children on beds, weeping mothers, small table with cut- orange, Bible and physic by bedside, and pitying angel dimly hovering between mantelpiece and ceiling, — which, originally in oil, and subsequently in engravings, had such a vast sale, and brought so much ready money to Caniche's exchequer. The situation was central ; why not utilise it ? No sooner thought of than done : a red cotton- velvet coA^erlet was spread over Jimmy Dabb's bed in the corner ; a Dutch carpet, red with black flecks, was, at Caniche's expense, spread over the floor, paint-smeared and 16 LAND AT LAST. burnt with tobacco-asli ; two gorgeous easels, on which were displayed Wilkins' two pictures, " Tlie Bird in the Hand" — every feather in the bird and the dii-t in the nails of the ploughboy's hand mar- vellously delineated — and " Cnimbs of Comfort," each crumb separate, and the loaf in the back- ground so real, that the Dowager-Countess of Rundall, a celebrated household manager, declared it at once to be a " slack-baked quartern." Invita- tion-cards, AvonderfuUy illuminated in Old- English characters, and utterly illegible, were sent forth to rank, fashion, and talent, who duly attended. Crowds of gay carriages choked up the little street : Dabb in his Sunday-clothes did the honours ; Caniche, bland, smiling, and polyglot, flitted here and there, his clerk took down orders for proof- copies, and the fortune of the chambers was made. Tliey were so original, so artistic, so convenient, they w^ere just the place for a painter. Smudge, R.A., who painted portraits of the aristocracy, who wore a velvet- coat, and whose name was seen in the tail-end of the hst of fashionables at evening- parties, took a vacant set at once ; and Clement THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 17 Walkinshaw of the Foreign Office, who passed such spare time as his country could afford him in illuminating missals, in preparing designs for stained glass, and in hanging about art-circles generally, secured the remainder of the upper- floor, and converted it into a Wardour- Street Paradise, with hanging velvet 2^ortiereSy old oak cabinets, Venetian glass, marqueterie tables, Se\T:es china, escutcheons of armour, and Viennese porce- lain pipes. Meanwhile, utterly uncaring for and utterly independent of what went on upstairs, the denizens of the lower story kept quietly on. Who were the denizens of the lower story? who but the well- known Titian Sketching- Club ! How many men, who, after struggling through Suffolk Street and the Portland Gallery, have won their way to fame and fortune, have made their coitjy cVessai on the walls of the chambers rented by the Titian Sketch- ing-Club ! Outsiders, who professed great love for art, but who only knew the two or three exhibitions of the season, and only recognised the score of names in each vouchsafed for by the newspaper- VOL. I. c IS LAND AT LAST. critics, would have been astonished to learn the amount of canvas covered, pains taken, and skill brought to bear upon the work of the members of the Titian. There are guilds, and companies of •Freemasons, and brotherhoods by the score in London; but I know of none where the grand spirit of Camaraderie is so carried out as in this. It is the nearest thing to the Vie de Boheme of Paris of Henri Mm-ger that we can show ; there is more liberty of speech and thought and action, less reticence, more friendship, — when friendship is understood by pm-se-sharing, by sick-bedside- "watching, by absence of envy, jealousy, hatred^ and all uncharitableness,— more singleness of pur- pose, more contempt for shams and impostures and the dismal fetters of conventionality, than in ariy other circle of English society with which I am acquainted. It was a grand night with the Titians; no model was carefully posed on the " tlu'one" that evening; no intelligent class was grouped round on the rising benches, copying from the ^'draped'' or the '^ nude ;" none of the wardrobe or properties THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 19 of the club (and it is rich in both), — none of the coats of mail or suits of armour, hauberks and broadswords, buff boots, dinted breastplates, carved ebony crucifixes, ivory-hafted daggers, Louis-Onze caps, friars' gowns and rosaries, nor other portions of the stock-in-trade, were on view. Tlie " send- ing-in" day for the approaching Exhibition of the British Institution was at hand; and the dis- coloured smoky old walls of the Titians, the rickety easels piled round the room, all available ledges and nooks, were covered with the works of the members of the club, which they fully intended to submit for exliibition. A very Babel, in a thick fog of tobacco- smoke, through which loomed the red face of Flexor the famous model, like the sun in November, greeted you on your entrance. Flexor pretended to take the hats, but the visitors seemed to know liim too well, and contented them- selves with nodding at him in a friendly manner, and retaining their property. Then you passed into the rooms, where you found yourself wedged- up amongst a crowd of perhaps the most extraor- dinary-looking beings you ever encountered. Little 20 LAND AT LAST. men with big heads and long beards, big men with bald heads and shaved cheeks, and enormous moustaches and glowering spectacles; tall thin straggling men, who seemed all profile, and whose full face you could never catch ; dirty shaggy httle men, with heads of hair like red mops, and no ap- parent faces underneath, whose eyes flashed through their elf-locks, and who were explaining their pic- tures with singular pantomimic power of their sinewy hands, and notably of their ever-flashing thumbs ; moon-faced solemn didactic men, prosing away on their views of art to dreary discontented listeners ; and foppish, smart little fellows, stand- ing a- tiptoe to get particular lights, shading their eyes with their hands, and backing against the company generally. Moving here and there among the guests was the Titians' president, honest old Tom Wrigley, who had been " at it," as he used to say, for thirty years, without making any great mark in his profession, but who was cordially be- loved for his kind-heartedness and bonhomie, and who had a word and a joke for all. As he elbowed his way tlu'ough the room he spoke right and left. THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 2 1 "HaUo, Tom Rogers!— liallo, Tom! Tliat's an improvement, Tom, my boy ! Got rid of the heavy browns, eh? weren't good, those hesLvy browns ; specially for a Venetian atmosphere, eh, Tom ? Much better, this. — How are you, Jukes ? Old story. Jukes ? — ^hen and chickens, ducks in the pond, horse looking over the gate ? Quite right, Jukes ; stick to that, if it pays. Much better than the death of J. Caesar on a twenty-foot canvas, which nobody would be fool enough to buy. Stick to the ducks, Jukes, old fellow. — What's the matter, George ? Why so savage, my son ?" " Here's Scumble !" said the young man ad- dressed, in an undertone. " And what of that, George ? Mr. Scumble is a Royal Academician, it is true ; and consequently a mark for your scorn and hatred, George. But it's not Ms fault ; he never did any thing to aspire to such a dignity. It's your British public, George, which is such an insensate jackass as to buy Scmn- ble's pictures, and to tell him he's a genius." " He was on the Han ffino^- Committee last year, and — " 22f LAND AT LAST. " Ah, so he was ; and your ^ Aristides ' was kicked out, and so was my ' Hope Deferred^' which was a deuced sight better than your big picture. Master Greorge ; but see how I shall treat him. — How do you do, Mr. Scumble? You're very welcome here, sir." Mr. Scumble, K.A., who had a head hke a tin- loaf, and a face without any earthly expression, bowed his acknowledgments, and threw as much warmth into his manner as he possibly could, ap- parently labouring under a notion that he was marked out for speedy assassination. " This is indeed a char-ming collection ! Great talent among the ri-sing men, Mr. — pardon me — Pre- sident! This now, for instance, — a most charm- ing landscape !" " Yes, old boy ; you may say that," said a square-built man smoking a clay-pipe, and lean- ing \^ath his elbows on the easel on wdiicli the pic- ture was placed. '^ I mean the real tiling, — not this; which ain't bad though, is it? Not that I should say so; 'cause for why; which I did it!" and here the square-built man removed one of his THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 23 elbows from the easel, and dug it into tlie sacred ribs of Scumble, RA, " Bad, sir !" said Scumble, recoiling from the thrust, and still with the notion of a secret dagger hidden behind the square-built man's waistcoat; ^^it's magnificent, superb, Mr. — !" " Meaning me ? Potts !" said the square-built man — " Charley Potts, artist, U.E., or unsuccess- ful exliibitor at every daub-show in London. That's the Via Mala, that is. I was there last autumn with Geoffrey Ludlow and Tom Bleistift. ' Show me a finer view than that,' I said to those fellows, when it burst upon us. ^ If you'd a Scotchman with you,' said Tom, ^he'd say it wasn't so fine as the approach to Edinburgh.' ^ Would he?' said L ' If he said any thing of that sort, I'd show him that view, and — and rub his nose in it!'" Mr. Scumble, E.A., smiled in a sickly manner, bowed feebly, and passed on. Old Tom Wrigley laughed a great boisterous "Ha, ha!" and went on his way. Charley Potts remained before his picture, turning his back on it, and puffing out great volumes of smoke. He seemed to know 24 LAND AT LAST. every body in the room, and to be kno^\Ti to and greeted by most of them. Some slapped him on the back, some poked him in the ribs, others laid their forefingers alongside their noses and winked ; but all called him " Charley," and all had some pleasant word for liim ; and to all he had some- thing to say in return. '' HaUo, Fred Snitterfeld I" he called out to a fat man in a suit of shepherd's-plaid dittoes. ^' Halloa, Fred ! how's your brother Bill ? What's he been doing ? Not here to-night, of course ?" " No ; he wasn't very well," said the man ad- dressed. " He's got — " ^^Yes, yes; I know, Fred!" said Charley Potts. '' Wife won't let him ! That's it, isn't it, old boy ? He only dined out once in his Hfe with- out leave, and then he sent home a telegram to sa}* he was engaged ; and when his wife received the telegram she would not believe it, because she said it wasn't his handwriting ! Poor old Bill ! Did he sell that ^ Kevenge ' to what's-his-name — that Manchester man — Prebble?" . *^Lord, no! Haven't you heard? Prebble's THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 25 smashed up, — all his property gone to the devil!" " Ah, then Prebble will find it again some day, no doubt. Look out ! here's Bowie !" Mr. Bowie was the art-critic of a great daily journal. In early life he had courted art himself; but lacking executive power, he had mixed up a few theories and quaint conceits which he had learned with a great deal of acrid bile, with which he had been gifted by nature, and wrote the most pungent and malevolent art-notices of the day. A tall, light-haired, vacant-looking man, like a light- house without any light in it, peering micomfort- ably over his stiff white cravat, and fumbling ner- vously at his watch-chain. Clinging close to him, and pointing out to him various pictures as they passed them by, was quite another style of man, — Caniche, the great picture-dealer, — an under-sized lively Gascon, black-bearded from his chin, round which it was closely cut, to his beady black eyes, faultlessly dressed, sparkling in speech, affable in manner, at home with all. " All, ah !" said he, stopping before the easel, S^ LAND AT LAST. "the Via Mala! Not bad— not at all bad!" he continued, with scarcely a trace of a foreign ac- cent. "Yours J Charley Potts? yours, mon brave f De-caidedly an improvement, Charley! You go on that way, mai boy, and some day — " " Some day you'll give me twenty pound, and. sell me for a hundred! won't you, Caniche? — generous buffalo!" growded Charley, over his pipe. The men round laughed, but Caniche was not a bit offended. " Of course," he said, simply, " I will, indeed ; that is my trade ! And if you could find a man who would give you thirty, you woiUd throw me over in what you call a brace of shakes ! JSf^est-ce pas? Meanwhile find the man to give you thirty. He is not here ; I mean coming now* — How do you do, Herr Stompff ?" Mr. Caniche (popularly known as Cannish among the artists) winced as he said this, for Herr Stompff was his great rival and bitterest enemy. A short, bald-headed, gray-bearded man was Mr. Stompff, — a Hamburger, — ^^vllo, on his first arrival in England, had been an importer of j^iping bullfinches at Hull ; then a tobacconist in Si Mary THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 27. Axe ; and who finally had taken up picture-selling, and did an enormous business. No one could tell, that he was not an Englishman from his talk, and an Englishman with a marvellous fluency in tlie vernacular. He had every slang saying as soon as it was out, and by this used to triumph over Ms rival Caniche, who never could follow his phraseology. "Hallo, Caniche!" he said; "how are you? What's up ? — ^running the rig on the boys here ! telling Charley Potts his daubs are first-rate? Pickles ! — We know all that game, don't we, Charley? What do you want for it, Charley? — How are you, Mr. Bowie? what's fresh with you, sir? Too proud to come and have a cut of mutton with me and Mrs. S. a-Simday, I suppose ? Some good fellers coming, too ; Mug- ger from the Cracksideum, and Talboys and Sir Paul Potter — leastways I've asked him. — Well, Charley, what's the figure for this lot, eh?" "Fll trouble you not to 'Charley' me, Mr* Stump, or whatever your infernal name is !" said Potts, folding his arms and puffing out his smoke 28 • LAND AT LAST. savagely. " I don't want any Havannah cigars, nor silk handkerchiefs, nor painted canaries, nor any thing else in your line, sir ; and I want your confounded patronage least of all !" " Good boy, Charley ! very good boy !" said StompiF, calmly pulling his whisker through his teeth — " shouldn't lose his temper, though. Come and dine a- Sunday, Charley." Mr. Potts said something, which the historian is not bound to repeat, turned on his heel and walked away. Mr. StompfF was not a bit disconcerted at this treatment. He merely stuck his tongue in his cheek, and looking at the men standing round, said, ^^ He's on the high ropes, is Master Charley ! Some of you fellows have been lending him half-a- crown, or that fool Caniche has bought one of his pictures for seven-and-six ! Now, has any body any thing new to show, eh?" Of course every body had something new to show to the great Stompff, the enterprising Stompff, the liberal Stompff, whose cheques were as good as notes of the Bank of England. How they watched his progress, and how their hearts beat as he loitered THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 29 before their works ! Jupp, who had a bed-ridden wife, a dear pretty Httle woman recovering from rheumatic fever at Adalbert Villa, Elgiva Eoad, St John's Wood ; Smethurst, who had a 25Z. bill coming due in a fortnight, and had three-and- sevenpence wherewith to meet it ; Vogelstadt, who had been beguiled into leaving Diisseldorf for London on the rumours of Enorlish riches and English patronage, and whose capital studies of birds in the snow, and treihejagds, and boar-hunts, had called forth universal laudation, but had not as yet entrapped a single purchaser, so that Vogel- stadt, who had come down not discontentedly to living on bread-and-milk, had notions of mort- gaging his ancestral thumb-ring to procure even those trifling necessaries, — how they all glared with expectation as the ex-singing-bird-importer passed their pictures in review ! Tliat worthy took matters very easily, strolling along with his hands in his pockets, glancing at the easels and along the walls, occasionally nodding his head in approval, or shrugging his shoulders in deprecia- tion, but never saying a word until he stopped so LAKD AT LAST. opposite a well-placed figure-subject to which he devoted a two-minutes' close scrutiny, and then uttered this frank though cu^rfot-tinged criticism, ^' That'll hit 'em up ! that'll open then- eyelids, by Jove ! Whose is it ?" The picture represented a modern ballroom, in a comer of which a man of middle age, his arms tightly folded across his breast, was intently watch- ing the movements of ayomig girl, just starting off in a valse with a handsome dashing young partner. The expressions in the two faces were admirably ■defined : in the man's was a deep earnest devotion not unmingled with passion and with jealousy, his tightly-clenched mouth, his deej^-set earnest eyes, settled in rapt adoration on the girl, showed the earnestness of his feeling, so did the rigidly-fixed arms, and the |?ose of the figure, which, originally careless, had become hardened and angular through intensity of feeling. The contrast was well marked: in the girl's face, which was turned toward the man wdiile her eyes were fixed on him, was a bright saucy triumph, brightening her eyes, in- flating her little nostrils, cm-ving the corners of THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 31 her moutli, while her figure was hght and airy, just obedient to the first notes of the valse^ balancing itself as it were on the ami of her partner before startino- off down the dance. All the accessories were admirable: the dreary wallfloAvers ranged round the room, the chaperons nid-nodding toge- tlier on the rout-seats, paterfamilias despondingly consulting his watch, the wearied hostess, and the somnolently-inclined musicians, — all were there, portrayed not merely by a facile hand but by a man conversant with society. Tlie title of the picture, " Sic vos non vobls," was written on a bit of paper stuck into the frame, on the other corner of which was a card bearing the words "Mr. Geoffrey Ludlow." " Ab !" said Stompff, who, after carefully scan- nmg the picture close and then from a distance, had read the card — " at last ! Geoffrey Ludlow's going to fulfil the promise which he's been show- ing this ten years ! A late birth, but a fine . l3abby noAv it's bom ! Tliat's the real thing and no flies ! Tliat's about as near a good thing as I've seen this long thne — that; come, 32 LAND AT LAST. you'll say the same I That's a good picture, Mr. Wrigley !" "Ah!" said old Tom, coming up at the mo- ment, " you've made another lucky hit if you've bought that, Mr. StompfF! Geoff is so confound- edly midecided, so horribly weak in all tilings, that he's been all this time making up his mind whether he really would paint a good picture or not. But he's decided at last, and he has painted a chpper." " Ye-es ! said Stompff, whose first enthusiasm had by no means died away — on the conti'ary, he thought so well of the pictm-e that he had within himself determined to purchase it ; but his business caution was coming over him strongly. " Yes ! it's a clipper, as you say, Wrigley ; but it's a pic- ture which would take all a fellow knew to work it. Tln-ow that into the mai'ket — ^where are you ? Pouf! gone! no one thinking of it. Judicious advertisement, judicious squaring of those con- founded fellows of the press ; a little dinner at the Albion or the Star and Garter to two or three whom we know ; and then the wonderful grasp of modern life, the singular manner in which the THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 33 great natural feelings are rendered, tlie micro- scopic observation, and tlie power of detail — " "Yes, yes," said Tom Wrigley; "for wliicli, see Ccdalogi.ie of Stompff^s Gallery of Modern Paint- ers^ price Gd Spare yourself, you unselfish en- courager of talent, and spare Geoff's blushes; for here he is. — Did you hear what Stompff was saying on, Geoff?" As he spoke, there came slouching up, shoul- dering his way tln-ough the crowd, a big, heavily- built man of about forty years of age, standing over six feet, and strildng in appearance, if not prepossessing. Striking in appearance from his height, which was even increased by his great shock head of dark-brown hair standing upright on his forehead, but curling in tight crisp waves round the back and poll of his head; from his great prominent bro^vn eyes, which, firmly set in their large thickly-carved lids, flashed from under an overhanging pair of brows; from his large heavy nose, thick and fleshy, yet with lithe sensitive nostrils; from his short upper and pro- truding thick under lip; from the length of his VOL. I. D 34 LAND AT LAST. chin and the massive heaviness of his jaw, though the hea\y beard greatly concealed the formation of the lower portion of his face. A face which at once evoked attention, which no one passed by without noticing, which people at first called ^^odd," and "singular," and "queer," accord- ing to their vocabulary; then, following the same rule, pronounced "ugly," or "hideous," or "gro- tesque" — allowing all the time that there " was something very curious in it." But a face which, when seen in animation or excitement, in reflex of the soul within, whose every thought was legibly portrayed in its every expression, in light or shade, Avith earnest watchful eyes, and knit brows and quivering nostrils and working lips ; or, on the other hand, with its mouth full of sound big white teeth gleaming between its ruddy lips, and its eyes sparkling with pure merriment or mischief; — then a face to be pre- ferred to all the dolly inanities of the Household Brigade, or even the matchless toga-di'aped dmnmies in Mr. Truefitt's window. This was Geoffrey Ludlow, whom every body liked, but THE BRETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 35 who was esteemed to be so weak and vacillating, so infirm of purpose, so incapable of succeeding in liis art or in his life, as to have been always I'egarded as an object of pity rather than envy; as a man who was his own worst enemy, and of whom nothing coidd be said. He had apparently €aught some words of the conversation, for when he arrived at the group a smile lit up his homely -features, and his teeth glistened again in the gas- light. "What are you fellows joking about?" he asked, while he roared with laughter, as if with an anticipatory relish of the fun. " Some chaff at my expense, eh? Something about my not having made up my mind to do something or not ; the usual nonsense, I suppose ?" " Not at all, Geoff," said Tom Wrigley. " Tlie ^question asked by Mr. Stompff here was — whether you wished to sell this picture, and what you asked for it." "Ah!" said GeoflPrey Ludlow, his lips closing ^nd the fun dying out of his eyes. " Well, you see it's of course a compliment for you, Mr. Stompff, to 36 LAND AT LAST. ask the question; but I've scarcely made up my mind — wlietlier — and indeed as to the price — " " Stuff, Geoff! What rubbish you talk I" said Charley Potts, who had rejoined the group. " You know Avell enougli that you painted the picture for sale. You know equally well that the price is two hiuidred guineas. Are you answered, Mr. Stump?" •t Ludlow started forward with a look of annoy- ance, but Stomj^ff merely grinned, and said quietly, ^^ I take it at the price, and as many more as Mr. Ludlow will paint of the same sort; stock, lock, and barrel, I'll have the whole bilin. Must change the title though, Ludlow, my boy. None of your Sic w^os non thingummy; none of your Hebrew classics for the British public. ^Tlie A^ow,' or ' The Last Farewell,' or something in that line. — Very neatly done of you, Charley, my boy ; very neat bit of dealing, I call it. I ought to deduct four -and -nine from the next fifteen shillin' commission you get; but I'll make it up to you this way, — you've evidently all the quali- ties of a salesman; come and be my clerk, and THE BKETHREN OF THE BRUSH. 37 I'll stand tliirty shillings a-week and a commis- sion on the cataloo^ues." Charley Potts was too delighted at his friend's success to feel annoyance at these remarks ; he merely shook his fist laughingly, and was passing on, with his arm through Ludlow's ; but the vivacious dealer, Avho had rapidly calculated where he could plant his newly-acquired pur- chase, and what percentage he could make on it, was not to be thus balked. " Look here !" said he ; "a bargain's a bar- gain, ain't it ? People say your word's as good as your bond, and all that. Pickles ! You di'op down to my office to - morrow, Ludlow, and there'll be an agreement for you to sign — all straight and reg'lar, you know. And come and cut yom' mutton with me and Mrs. S. at Velas- quez Villa, Nottin' '111, on Sunday, at six. No sayin' no, because I won't hear it. We'll wet om' connection in a glass of Sham. And bring Charley with you, if his dress-coat ain't up ! You know, Charley! Tar, tar!'* And highly dehghted witli himself, and with the full conviction tliat lie 38 LAND AT LAST. had rendered himself thoroughly dehghtful to his hearers, the great man waddled off to his hrougham. Meanwhile the news of the purchase had spread tln-ough the rooms, and men were hurry- ing up on all sides to congratulate Ludlow on his success. The fortunate man seemed, how- ever, a little dazed with his triumph; he shook all the outstretched hands cordially, and said a few commonplaces of thanks, intermingled with doubts as to whether he had not been too well treated ; but on the first convenient opportmiity he slipped away, and sliding a shilling into the palm of Flexor the model, who, being by this time very drunk, had arranged his hair in a curl on his forehead, and was sitting on the bench in the hall after his famous renderinij of George the Fourth of blessed memory, Geoff seized his hat and coat and let himself out. The fresh night-air revived him wonderfully, and lie was about starting- off at his usual headstrong pace, when he heard a low dismal moan, and looking round, he saw a female figure cowering in a door- way. The next instant he was kneeling by her side. CHAPTER HI. BLOTTED OUT. The strange caprices of Fashion were never more strangely illustrated than by her fixing upon St. Barnabas Square as one of her favourite localities. There are men yet living among us whose mothers had been robbed on their way from Ranelagh in crossing the spot, then a dreary swampy marsh, on which noAv stands the city of palaces known as Cubittopolis. For years on years it remained in its dismal condition, until an enterprising builder, seeing the army of ci^i- lisation advancing with grand strides south-west- ward, and perceiving at a glance the immediate realisation ' of an enormous profit on his outlay, bought up the entire estate, had it thoroughly cleansed and di'ained, and proceeded to erect thereon a series of terraces, places, and squares. 40 LAKD AT LAST. each vying witli the other in size, perfection of finish, and, let it be said, general ghastliness. The houses in St. Barnabas Square resemble those in Chasuble Crescent, and scarcely differ in any j)articular from the eligible residences in Reredos Eoad : they are all very tall, and rather thin ; they have all enormous porticoes, over which are little conservatories, railed in with ecclesiastical ironwork; dismal little back-rooms no biiffrer than warm-baths, but described as ^^ libraries" by the house - agents ; gaunt drawing - rooms con- nected by an arch ; vast landings, leading on to other little conservatories, where ''blacks," old flower- pots, and a few geranium stumps, are prin- cipally conserved ; and a series of gamit towny bedrooms. In front they have Mr. Swiveller's prospect, — a delightful view of over-tlic-Avay : across the bit of square enclosure like a green pocket-handkerchief; while at the back they look immediately on to the back - premises of other eligible residences. The enterprising builder has done his best for his neighbourhood, but he has been unable to iieutralise the effects of the neio;h- BLOTTED OUT. 41 bouring Thames ; and the consequence is, that during the winter months a cln'onic fog drifts up from tlie pleasant Kentish marshes, and find- ing ample room and verge enough, settles per- manently down in the St. Barnabas district ; while in the summer, the new roads which in- tersect the locality, being mostly composed of a chalky foundation, peel off mider every passing wheel, and emit enormous clouds of dust, which are generally drifting on the summer wind into the eyes and mouths of stray passengers, and in at the doors and windows of regular residents. Yet this is one of Fashion's chosen spots : here in this stronghold of stucco reside scores of those whose names and doings the com'tly jom-nalist delighteth to clu'onicle ; hither do count}^ mag- nates bring, to furnished houses, their wives and daughters, leaving them to entertain those of the proper set during the three summer months, while they, the county magnates themselves, are sleep- ing the sleep of the just on the benches of the House of Commons, or nobly discharging their duty to their country by smoking cigars on the 42 LAKD AT LAST. terrace ; here reside men high up in the great West-end pubhc offices, commissioners and secre- taries, anxious to imbue tliemselves with the scent of the rose, and vivre pres cVellej City magnates, judges of the land, and counsel learned in the law. Tlie situation is near to Westminster for the lawyers and politicians ; and the address has quite enouo-h of the true rino- about it to make it much sought after by all those who go-in for a fashion- able neighbourhood. A few hours before the events described in the preceding chapters took place, a brougham, perfectly appointed, and drawn by a splendid horse, came dashino; throuo-h the foo; and cbivino- mist, and pulled up before one of the largest houses in St. Barnabas Square. Tlie footman jumped fi'om the box, and was rmming to the door, when, in obedience to a sharp voice, he stopped, and the occupant of the vehicle, who had descended, crossed the pavement with rapid strides, and opened the door with a pass-key. He strode quickly through the hall, up the staircase, and into the drawing-room, romid wliich he took BLOTTED OUT. 43 a rapid glance. The room was empty ; the gas was ht, and a fire burned brightly on the hearth ; while an open piano, covered with music, on the one side of the fire-place, and a book turned down with open leaves, showed that the occupants had but recently lefl. The new-comer, finding him- self alone, walked to the mantelpiece, and leaning his back against it, passed his hands rapidly across his forehead ; then pkmging both of them into his pockets, seemed lost in thought. The gaslight showed him to be a man of about sixty years of age, tall, wiry, well-proportioned ; his head was bald, with a fringe of grayish hair, his forehead broad, his eyes deep-set, his mouth thin-lipped and ascetic ; he wore two little strips of whisker, but his chin was closely shaved. He was dressed in high stiff shirt- collars, a blue-silk neckerchief with white dots, in which gleamed a carbuncle pin ; a gray overcoat, under which was a cutaway riding-coat, high waistcoat with onyx buttons, and tight-fitting cord-trousers. Tliis was George Brake- spere, third Earl Beauport, of whom and of whose family it behoves one to speak in detail. 44 LiVND AT LAST. Tliey were oiovi homines, the Brakesperes, though they ahvays claimed to be sprung from ancient Norman l^lood. Only seventy years ago old Martin Brakespere was a woolstapler in Uttoxeter; and though highly respected for the wealth he was re- ported to have amassed, was very much jeered at privately, and with bated breath, for keepmg an apocryphal genealogical tree hanging up in his back-shop, and for invariably boasting, after liis second glass of grog at the Greyhound, about his lineage. But when, after old Martin had been some score years quietly resting in Uttoxeter chm'chyard, his son Sir Eichard Brakespere, who had been successively solicitor and attorney ge- neral, was raised to the peerage, and took his seat on the woolsack as Baron Beauport, Lord High Chancellor of England, the Herald's College, and all the rest of the genealogical authorities, said that the line was thoroughly made out, and received the revival of the ancient title with the greatest laudation. A wiry, fox-headi'd, thin chip of a lawyer, the first Baron Beauport, as knowing as a ferret, and not unlike one in the face. He BLOTTED OUT. 45 administered the laws of his country very well, and he lent some of the money he had inherited from his father to the sovereign of his country and the first gentleman in Em-ope at a very high rate of interest, it is said. Rumom* reports that he did not get all his money back again, taking instead thereof an increase in rank, and dying, at an advanced age, as Eaid Beauport, succeeded in his title and estates by his only son, Tlieodore Brakespere, by courtesy Yiscomit Caterham. When his father died, Lord Caterham, the second Earl Beauport, was nearly fifty years old, a prim little gentleman who loved music and wore a wig ; a di'ied-up chip of a little man, who lived in a little house in Hans Place with an old ser- vant, a big violoncello, and a special and peculiar breed of pug-dogs. To walk out with the pug- dogs in the morning, to be carefully dressed and tittivated and buckled and cm-led by the old servant in the afternoon, and either to ]Aay tlie violoncello in a Beethoven or Mozart selection with some other old amateur fogies, or to be pre- sent at a performance of chamber-music, or phil- 46 LAND AT LAST. harmonics, or oratorio-rehearsals in the evening, constituted the sole pleasure of the second Earl Beauport's life. He never married; and at his death, some fifteen years after his father's, the title and, with the excej^tion of a few legacies to musical charities, the estates passed to liis cousin George Brakespere, Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxon, and then of Little Milman Street, Bed- ford Row, and the Northern Circuit, briefless barrister. Just in the very nick of time came the peerage and the estates to George Brakespere, for he was surrounded by duns, and over head and ears in love. With all his hard work at Oxford, and he had worked hard, he had the reputation of being the best bowler at Bullingdon, and the hardest rider after hounds; of having the best old port and the finest cigars (it was before the days of claret and short pipes), and the best old oak fui'- niture, library of books, and before-letter proofs in the University. All these could not be paid for out of an undergraduate's income; and tlie large remainder of unpaid bills hung round him BLOTTED OUT. 47 and plagued lilm lieavily long after lie liad left Oxford and been called to tlie bar. It was horribly up-liill work getting a connection among the at- torneys ; he tried writing for reviews, and suc- ceeded, but earned very little money. And then, on circuit, at an assize-ball, he fell m love with Gertrude Carrington, a haughty county beauty, only daughter of Sir Joshua Carrington, Chair- ;man of Quarter Sessions ; and that nearly finished him. Gertrude Carrington w^as very haughty and very wilful ; she admired the clever face and the bold bearing of the young barrister ; but in all probability she would have thought no more of him, had not the eminent Sir Joshua, who kept his eyes very sharply about him, marked the flu'tation, and immediately expressed liis total dis- approval of it. That was enough for Gertrude, and she at once went in for George Brakespere, heart and soul. She made no objection to a clan- destine correspondence, and responded regularly and warmly to George's passionate letters. She gave liim two or tln-ee secret meetings under an old oak in a secluded part of her father's park, — 48 LAND AT LAST. Homersliams was a five-hours' joui'iiey from towii, — and these assignations always involved George's sleeping at an inn, and put him to large expense ; and when she came up to stay Avith her cousins in town, she let him know all the parties to which they were going, and rendered liim a mendicant for invitations. When the change of fortune came, and George succeeded to the title. Sir Joshua succumbed at once, and became anxious for the match. Had George inherited money only, it is probable that from sheer wilfiilness Gertrude would have thrown him over ; but the notion of being a countess, of taking precedence and pas of all the neighbom'ing gentry, had its influence, and they were married. Two sons were born to them, — Viscount Caterham and the Hon. Lionel Brakespere, — and a daughter, who only survived her birth a few weeks. As Earl Beau- port, George Brakespere retained the energy and activity of mind and body, the love of exercise and field-sports, the clear brain and singleness of purpose, which had distinguished him as a com- moner : but there was a skeleton in his house, BLOTTED OUT. 40 wliose bony fingers touclied liis heart in liis gayest moments, numbed his energies, and warped his usefuhiess ; whose dread presence he could not escape from, whose chilhng influence nor Avine, nor work, nor medicine, nor gaiety, could palliate. It was ever present in a tangible shape ; he knew his weakness and wickedness in permitting it to conquer him, — he strove against it, but vainly; and in the dead watches of the night often he lay broad awake railing against the fate which had mingled so bitter an ingredient in his cup of happiness. Tlie door swung open and the Countess en- tered, a woman nearly fift}^ now, but not looking her age by at least eight years. A tall handsome woman, v/ith the charms of her former beauty mellowed but not impaired : the face was more full, but the firm chiselling of the nose and lips, the brightness of the eyes, the luxurious dark