PUNCH,
OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
Vol. 107.
July 28, 1894.
LORD ORMONT'S MATE AND MATEY'S AMINTA.
By G***GE M*R*D*TH.
Volume I.
This was a school. Small wonder if the boys, doubly sensitiveunder a supercilious head-master of laughter-moving invention,poised for a moment on the to and fro of a needless knockabout jig-facewith chin and mouth all a-pucker forthe inquisitive contest. The stout arecandid puff-balls blowing in an open seaof purposeless panting, hard to stir intoan elephantine surging from arm-chairs;and these are for frock-coats, and theycan wear watch-chains. So these boysunderstood it. Murat here, Murat there,Murat everywhere, with Shaldersa-burst at the small end of a trumpet,cheeks rounded to the full note of anusher's eulogy, like a roar and no mistake,arduous in the moment, throbbingbeneath a schoolmaster's threadbare waistcoat,a heart all dandelions to the plucker,yellow on top with white shifts for feather-fringe;or a daisy, transferring petulanceon a bath-chair wheezing and groaning—onthe swing for the capture of a fare—orshall it be a fair, that too a wheeze permittedto propriety hoist on a flaxy,grinning chub. This was Shalders.
Lady Charlotte Eglett appeared.Hers was the brother, the Lord Ormontwe know, a general of cavalry not adoubt, all sabretache, spurs and plumes,dashing away into a Hindoo desert likethe soldier he is, a born man sword in fist.She wrote, "Come to me. He is said tobe married."
He spoke to her. "My father was asoldier."
"He too?" she interposed.
Their eyes clashed.
"You are the tutor for me," she added.
"For your grandson," corrected he.
It was a bargain. They struck it. She glanced right and left,showing the town-bred tutor her hedges at the canter along themain road of her scheme.
His admiration of the cavalry-brother rose to a fever-point. Notgood with the pen, Lady Charlotte opined; hard to beat at asword-thrust, thought Matey. "Be his pen-holder," put in thelady. "I would," said he, smiling again. She split sides, convulsedin a take-offish murmur, a rollhere, a roll there, rib-tickling with eyesgoggling on the forefront of a sentenceall rags, tags, and splutters like a jerry-buildergaping at a waste land pegged outin plots, foundations on the dig, and auctioneerprowling hither thither, hammerready for the "gone" which shall spin anobody's land into a somebody's moneypassing over counter or otherwise pocket topocket, full to empty or almost empty, witha mowling choke-spark of a batter-foot allquills for the bean-feast. So they understoodit.
Matey then was Lord Ormont's secretary.A sad dog his Lordship; all thewomen on bended knees to his glory. Whoshall own him? What cares he so it be apetticoat? For women go the helter-skelterpace; head-first they plunge or kick likebarking cuckoos.