Tales of the Trains

“No! no! not a bit of it; she ain’t asleep, – they never do sleep, – never!”

“Oh!” thought I to myself, “there’s another class of people not remarkable for over-drowsiness; “for, to say truth, the expression of the speaker’s face and the oddity of his words made me suspect that he was not a miracle of sanity. The reflection had scarcely passed through my mind, when he arose softly from his seat, and assumed a place beside me.

“You thought she was fast,” said he, as he laid his hand familiarly on my arm; “I know you did, – I saw it the moment you came into the carriage.”

“Why, I did think – ”

“Ah! that’s deceived many a one. Lord bless you, sir, they are not understood, no one knows them; “and at these words he heaved a profound sigh, and dropped his head upon his bosom, as though the sentiment had overwhelmed him with affliction.

“Riddles, sir,” said he to me, with a glare of his eyes that really looked formidable, – “sphinxes; that’s what they are. Are you married?” whispered he.

“No, sir,” said I, politely; for as I began to entertain more serious doubts of my companion’s intellect, I resolved to treat him with every civility.

“I don’t believe it matters a fig,” said he; “the Pope of Rome knows as much about them as Bluebeard.”

“Indeed,” said I, “are these your sentiments?”

“They are,” replied he, in a still lower whisper; “and if we were to talk modern Greek this moment, I would not say but she” – and here he made a gesture towards the young lady opposite – “but she would know every word of it. It is not supernatural, sir, because the law is universal; but it is a most – what shall I say, sir? – a most extraordinary provision of nature, – wonderful! most wonderful!”

“In Heaven’s name, why did they let him out?” exclaimed I to myself.

“Now she is pretending to awake,” said he, as he nudged me with his elbow; “watch her, see how well she will do it.” Then turning to the lady, he added in a louder voice, —

“You have had a refreshing sleep, I trust, ma’am?”

“A very heavy one,” answered she, “for I was greatly fatigued.”

“Did not I tell you so?” whispered he again in my ear. “Oh!” and here he gave a deep groan, “when they ‘re in delicate health, and they ‘re greatly fatigued, there’s no being up to them!”

The remainder of our journey was not long in getting over; but brief as it was, I could not help feeling annoyed at the pertinacity with which the bilious gentleman purposely misunderstood every word the young lady spoke. The most plain, matter-of-fact observations from her were received by him as though she was a monster of duplicity; and a casual mistake as to the name of a station he pounced upon, as though it were a wilful and intentional untruth. This conduct, on his part, was made ten times worse to me by his continued nudgings of the elbow, sly winks, and muttered sentences of “You hear that” – “There’s more of it” – “You would not credit it now,” etc.; until at length he succeeded in silencing the poor girl, who, in all likelihood, set us both down for the two greatest savages in England.

On arriving at Dover, although I was the bearer of despatches requiring the utmost haste, a dreadful hurricane from the eastward, accompanied by a tremendous swell, prevented any packet venturing out to sea. The commander of “The Hornet,” however, told me, should the weather, as was not improbable, moderate towards daybreak, he would do his best to run me over to Calais; “only be ready,” said he, “at a moment’s notice, for I will get the steam up, and be off in a jiffy, whenever the tide begins to ebb.” In compliance with this injunction, I determined not to go to bed, and, ordering my supper in a private room, I prepared myself to pass the intervening time as well as might be.

“Mr. Yellowley’s compliments,” said the waiter, as I broke the crust of a veal-pie, and obtained a bird’s-eye view of that delicious interior, where hard eggs and jelly, mushrooms, and kidney, were blended together in a delicious harmony of coloring. “Mr. Yellowley’s compliments, sir, and will take it as a great favor if he might join you at supper.”

“Have not the pleasure of knowing him,” said I, shortly, – “bring me a pint of sherry, – don’t know Mr. Yellowley.”

“Yes, but you do, though,” said the gaunt man of the railroad, as he entered the room, with four cloaks on one arm, and two umbrellas under the other.

“Oh! it’s you,” said I, half rising from my chair; for in spite of my annoyance at the intrusion, a certain degree of fear of my companion overpowered me.

“Yes,” said he, solemnly. “Can you untie this cap? The string has got into a black-knot, I fear; “and so he bent down his huge face while I endeavored to relieve him of his head-piece, wondering within myself whether they had shaved him at the asylum.

“Ah, that’s comfortable!” said he at last; and he drew his chair to the table, and helped himself to a considerable portion of the pie, which he covered profusely with red pepper.

Little conversation passed during the meal. My companion ate voraciously, filling up every little pause that occurred by a groan or a sigh, whose vehemence and depth were strangely in contrast with his enjoyment of the good cheer. When the supper was over, and the waiter had placed fresh glasses, and with that gentle significance of his craft had deposited the decanter, in which a spoonful of sherry remained, directly in front of me, Mr. Yellowley looked at me for a moment, threw up his eyebrows, and with an air of more bonhomie than I thought he could muster, said, —

“You will have no objection, I hope, to a little warm brandy and water.”

“None whatever; and the less, if I may add a cigar.”

“Agreed,” said he.

These ingredients of our comfort being produced, and the waiter having left the room, Mr. Yellowley stirred the fire into a cheerful blaze, and, nodding amicably towards me, said, —

“Your health, sir; I should like to have added your name.”

“Tramp, – Tilbury Tramp,” said I, “at your service.” I would have added Q. C, as the couriers took that lately; but it leads to mistakes, so I said nothing about it.

“Mr. Tramp,” said my companion, while he placed one hand in his waistcoat, in that attitude so favored by John Kemble and Napoleon. “You are a young man?”

“Forty-two,” said I, “if I live till June.”

“You might be a hundred and forty-two, sir.”

“Lord bless you!” said I, “I don’t look so old.”

“I repeat it,” said he, “you might be a hundred and forty-two, and not know a whit more about them.”

“Here we are,” thought I, “back on the monomania.”

“You may smile,” said he, “it was an ungenerous insinuation. Nothing was farther from my thoughts; but it’s true, – they require the study of a lifetime. Talk of Law or Physic or Divinity; it’s child’s play, sir. Now, you thought that young girl was asleep.”

“Why, she certainly looked so.”

“Looked so,” said he, with a sneer; “what do I look like? Do I look like a man of sense or intelligence?”

“I protest,” said I, cautiously, “I won’t suffer myself to be led away by appearances; I would not wish to be unjust to you.”

“Well, sir, that artful young woman’s deception of you has preyed upon me ever since; I was going on to Walmer to-night, but I could n’t leave this without seeing you once more, and giving you a caution.”

“Dear me. I thought nothing about it. You took the matter too much to heart.”

“Too much to heart,” said he, with a bitter sneer; “that’s the cant that deceives half the world. If men, sir, instead of undervaluing these small and apparently trivial circumstances, would but recall their experiences, chronicle their facts, as Bacon recommended so wisely, we should possess some safe data to go upon, in our estimate of that deceitful sex.”

“I fear,” said I, half timidly, “you have been ill-treated by the ladies?”

A deep groan was the only response.

“Come, come, bear up,” said I; “you are young, and a fine-looking man still” (he was sixty, if he was an hour, and had a face like the figure-head of a war-steamer).

“I will tell you a story, Mr. Tramp,” said he, solemnly, – “a story to which, probably, no historian, from Polybius to Hoffman, has ever recorded a parallel. I am not aware, sir, that any man has sounded the oceanic depths of that perfidious gulf, – a woman’s heart; but I, sir, I have at least added some facts to the narrow stock of our knowledge regarding it. Listen to this:” —

I replenished my tumbler of brandy and water, looked at my watch, and, finding I still had two hours to spare, lent a not unwilling ear to my companion’s story.

“For the purpose of my tale,” said Mr. Yellowley, “it is unnecessary that I should mention any incident of my life more remote than a couple of years back. About that time it was, that, using all the influence of very powerful friends, I succeeded in obtaining the consul-generalship at Stralsund. My arrangements for departure were made with considerable despatch; but on the very week of my leaving England, an old friend of mine was appointed to a situation of considerable trust in the East, whither he was ordered to repair, I may say, at a moment’s notice. Never was there such a contretemps. He longed for the North of Europe, – I, with equal ardor, wished for a tropical climate; and here were we both going in the very direction antagonist to our wishes! My friend’s appointment was a much more lucrative one than mine; but so anxious was he for a residence more congenial to his taste, that he would have exchanged without a moment’s hesitation.

“By a mere accident, I mentioned this circumstance to the friend who had procured my promotion. Well, with the greatest alacrity, he volunteered his services to effect the exchange; and with such energy did he fulfil his pledge, that on the following evening I received an express, informing me of my altered destination, but directing me to proceed to Southampton on the next day, and sail by the Oriental steamer. This was speedy work, sir; but as my preparations for a journey had long been made, I had very little to do, but exchange some bear-skins with my friend for cotton shirts and jackets, and we both were accommodated. Never were two men in higher spirits, – he, with his young wife, delighted at escaping what he called banishment; I equally happy in my anticipation of the glorious East.

“Among the many papers forwarded to me from the Foreign Office was a special order for free transit the whole way to Calcutta. This document set forth the urgent necessity there existed to pay me every possible attention en route; in fact, it was a sort of Downing-Street firman, ordering all whom it might concern to take care of Simon Yellowley, nor permit him to suffer any let, impediment, or inconvenience on the road. But a strange thing, Mr. Tramp, – a very strange thing, – was in this paper. In the exchange of my friend’s appointment for my own, the clerk had merely inserted my name in lieu of his in all the papers; and then, sir, what should I discover but that this free transit extended to ‘Mr. Yellowley and lady,’ while, doubtless, my poor friend was obliged to travel en garçon? This extraordinary blunder I only discovered when leaving London in the train.

“We were a party of three, sir.” Here he groaned deeply. “Three, – just as it might be this very day. I occupied the place that you did this morning, while opposite to me were a lady and a gentleman. The gentleman was an old round-faced little man, chatty and merry after his fashion. The lady – the lady, sir – if I had never seen her but that day, I should now call her an angel. Yes, Mr. Tramp, I flatter myself that few men understand female beauty better. I admire the cold regularity and impassive loveliness of the North, I glory in the voluptuous magnificence of Italian beauty; I can relish the sparkling coquetry of France, the plaintive quietness and sleepy tenderness of Germany; nor do I undervalue the brown pellucid skin and flashing eye of the Malabar; but she, sir, she was something higher than all these; and it so chanced that I had ample time to observe her, for when I entered the carriage she was asleep – asleep,” said he, with a bitter mockery Macready might have envied. “Why do I say asleep? No, sir! – she was in that factitious trance, that wiliest device of Satan’s own creation, a woman’s sleep, – the thing invented, sir, merely to throw the shadow of dark lashes on a marble cheek, and leave beauty to sink into man’s heart without molestation. Sleep, sir! – the whole mischief the world does in its waking moments is nothing to the doings of such slumber! If she did not sleep, how could that braid of dark-brown hair fall loosely down upon her blue-veined hand; if she did not sleep, how could the color tinge with such evanescent loveliness the cheek it scarcely colored; if she did not sleep, how could her lips smile with the sweetness of some passing thought, thus half recorded? No, sir; she had been obliged to have sat bolt upright, with her gloves on and her veil down. She neither could have shown the delicious roundness of her throat nor the statue-like perfection of her instep. But sleep, – sleep is responsible for nothing. Oh, why did not Macbeth murder it, as he said he had!

“If I were a legislator, sir, I’d prohibit any woman under forty-three from sleeping in a public conveyance. It is downright dangerous, – I would n’t say it ain’t immoral. The immovable aspect of placid beauty, Mr. Tramp, etherealizes a woman. The shrewd housewife becomes a houri; and a milliner – ay, sir, a milliner – might be a Maid of Judah under such circumstances!”

Mr. Yellowley seemed to have run himself out of breath with this burst of enthusiasm; for he was unable to resume his narrative until several minutes after, when he proceeded thus:

“The fat gentleman and myself were soon engaged in conversation. He was hastening down to bid some friends good-bye, ere they sailed for India. I was about to leave my native country, too, – perhaps forever.

“‘Yes, sir,’ said I, addressing him, ‘Heaven knows when I shall behold these green valleys again, if ever. I have just been appointed Secretary and Chief Counsellor to the Political Resident at the court of the Rajah of Sautaucantantarabad! – a most important post – three thousand eight hundred and forty-seven miles beyond the Himalaya.’

“And here – with, I trust, a pardonable pride – I showed him the government order for my free transit, with the various directions and injunctions concerning my personal comfort and safety.

“‘Ah,’ said the old gentleman, putting on his spectacles to read, – ‘ah, I never beheld one of these before. Very curious, – very curious, indeed. I have seen a sheriff’s writ, and an execution; but this is far more remarkable, – “Simon Yellowley, Esq., and lady.” Eh? – so your lady accompanies you, sir?’

“‘Would she did, – would to Heaven she did!’ exclaimed I, in a transport.

“‘Oh, then, she’s afraid, is she? She dreads the blacks, I suppose.’

“‘No, sir; I am not married. The insertion of these words was a mistake of the official who made out my papers; for, alas! I am alone in the world.’

“‘But why don’t you marry, sir?’ said the little man, briskly, and with an eye glistening with paternity. ‘Young ladies ain’t scarce – ’

“‘True, most true; but even supposing I were fortunate enough to meet the object of my wishes, I have no time. I received this appointment last evening; to-day I am here, to-morrow I shall be on the billows!’

“‘Ah, that’s unfortunate, indeed, – very unfortunate.’

“‘Had I but one week, – a day, – ay, an hour, sir,’ said I, ‘I ‘d make an offer of my brilliant position to some lovely creature who, tired of the dreary North and its gloomy skies, would prefer the unclouded heaven of the Himalaya and the perfumed breezes of the valley of Santancantantarabad!’

“A lightly breathed sigh fell from the sleeping beauty, and at the same time a smile of inexpressible sweetness played upon her lips; but, like the ripple upon a glassy stream, that disappearing left all placid and motionless again, the fair features were in a moment calm as before.

“‘She looks delicate,’ whispered my companion.

“‘Our detestable climate!’ said I, bitterly; for she coughed twice at the instant. ‘Oh, why are the loveliest flowers the offspring of the deadliest soil!’

“She awoke, not suddenly or abruptly, but as Venus might have risen from the sparkling sea and thrown the dew-drops from her hair, and then she opened her eyes. Mr. Tramp, do you understand eyes?”

“I can’t say I have any skill that way, to speak of.”

“I’m sorry for it, – deeply, sincerely sorry; for to the uninitiated these things seem naught. It would be as unprofitable to put a Rembrandt before a blind man as discuss the aesthetics of eyelashes with the unbeliever. But you will understand me when I say that her eyes were blue, – blue as the Adriatic! – not the glassy doll’s-eye blue, that shines and glistens with a metallic lustre; nor that false depth, more gray than blue, that resembles a piece of tea-lead; but the color of the sea, as you behold it five fathoms down, beside the steep rocks of Genoa! And what an ocean is a woman’s eye, with bright thoughts floating through it, and love lurking at the bottom! Am I tedious, Mr. Tramp?”

“No; far from it, – only very poetical.”

“Ah, I was once,” said Mr. Yellowley, with a deep sigh. “I used to write sweet things for ‘The New Monthly;’ but Campbell was very jealous of me, – couldn’t abide me. Poor Campbell! he had his failings, like the rest of us.

“Well, sir, to resume. We arrived at Southampton, but only in time to hasten down to the pier, and take boat for the ship. The blue-peter was flying at the mast-head, and people hurrying away to say ‘good-bye’ for the last time. I, sir, I alone had no farewells to take. Simon Yellowley was leaving his native soil, unwept and unregretted! Sad thoughts these, Mr. Tramp, – very sad thoughts. Well, sir, we were aboard at last, above a hundred of us, standing amid the lumber of our carpet-bags, dressing-cases, and hat-boxes, half blinded by the heavy spray of the condensed steam, and all deafened by the din.

“The world of a great packet-ship, Mr. Tramp, is a very selfish world, and not a bad epitome of its relative on shore. Human weaknesses are so hemmed in by circumstances, the frailties that would have been dissipated in a wider space are so concentrated by compression, that middling people grow bad, and the bad become regular demons. There is, therefore, no such miserable den of selfish and egotistical caballing, slander, gossip, and all malevolence, as one of these. Envy of the man with a large berth, – sneers for the lady that whispered to the captain, – guesses as to the rank and station of every passenger, indulged in with a spirit of impertinence absolutely intolerable, – and petty exclu-siveness practised by every four or five on board, against some others who have fewer servants or less luggage than their neighbors. Into this human bee-hive was I now plunged, to be bored by the drones, stung by the wasps, and maddened by all. ‘No matter,’ thought I, 4 Simon Yellowley has a great mission to fulfil.’ Yes, Mr. Tramp, I remembered the precarious position of our Eastern possessions, – I bethought me of the incalculable services the ability of even a Yellow-ley might render his country in the far-off valley of the Himalaya, and I sat down on my portmanteau, a happier – nay, I will say, a better man.

“The accidents – we call them such every day – the accidents which fashion our lives, are always of our own devising, if we only were to take trouble enough to trace them. I have a theory on this head, but I ‘m keeping it over for a kind of a Bridgewater Treatise. It is enough now to remark that though my number at the dinner-table was 84, I exchanged with another gentleman, who could n’t bear a draught, for a place near the door, No. 122. Ah, me! little knew I then what that simple act was to bring with it. Bear in mind, Mr. Tramp, 122; for, as you may remember, Sancho Panza’s story of the goatherd stopped short, when his master forgot the number of the goats; and that great French novelist, M. de Balzac, always hangs the interest of his tale on some sum in arithmetic, in which his hero’s fortune is concerned: so my story bears upon this number. Yes, sir, the adjoining seat, No. 123, was vacant. There was a cover and a napkin, and there was a chair placed leaning against the table, to mark it out as the property of some one absent; and day by day was that vacant place the object of my conjectures. It was natural this should be the case. My left-hand neighbor was the first mate, one of those sea animals most detestable to a landsman. He had a sea appetite, a sea voice, sea jokes, and, worst of all, a sea laugh. I shall never forget that fellow. I never spoke to him that he did not reply in some slang of his abominable profession; and all the disagreeables of a floating existence were increased ten-fold by the everlasting reference to the hated theme, – a ship. What he on the right hand might prove, was therefore of some moment to me. Another Coup de Mer like this would be unendurable. The crossest old maid, the testiest old bachelor, the most peppery nabob, the flattest ensign, the most boring of tourists, the most careful of mothers, would be a boon from heaven in comparison with a blue-jacket. Alas! Mr. Tramp, I was left very long to speculate on this subject. We were buffeted down the Channel, we were tossed along the coast of France, and blown about the Bay of Biscay before 123 ever turned up; when one day – it was a deliciously calm day (I shall not forget it soon) – we even could see the coast of Portugal, with its great mountains above Cintra. Over a long reach of sea, glassy as a mirror, the great ship clove her way, – the long foam-track in her wake, the only stain on that blue surface. Every one was on deck: the old asthmatic gentleman, whose cough was the curse of the after-cabin, sat with a boa round his neck, and thought he enjoyed himself. Ladies in twos and threes walked up and down together, chatting as pleasantly as though in Kensington Gardens. The tourist sent out by Mr. Colburn was taking notes of the whole party, and the four officers in the Bengal Light Horse had adjourned their daily brandy and water to a little awning beside the wheel. There were sketch-books and embroidery-frames and journals on all sides; there was even a guitar, with a blue ribbon round it; and amid all these remindings of shore life, a fat poodle waddled about, and snarled at every one. The calm, sir, was a kind of doomsday, which evoked the dead from their tombs; and up they came from indescribable corners and nooks, opening their eyes with amazement upon the strange world before them, and some almost feeling that even the ordeal of sea-sickness was not too heavy a penalty for an hour so bright, though so fleeting.

“‘Which is 123?’ thought I, as I elbowed my way along the crowded quarter-deck, now asking myself could it be the thin gentleman with the two capes, or the fat lady with the three chins? But there is a prescience which never fails in the greater moments of our destiny, and this told me it was none of these. We went down to dinner, and for the first time the chair was not placed against the table, but so as to permit a person to be seated on it.

“‘I beg your pardon, sir,’ said the steward to me, ‘could you move a little this way? 123 is coming in to dinner, and she would like to have the air of the doorway.’

“‘She would,’ thought I; ‘oh, so this is a she, at all events;’ and scarce was the reflection made, when the rustle of a silk dress was heard brushing my chair. I turned, and what do you think, Mr. Tramp? – shall I endeavor to describe my emotions to you?”

This was said in a tone so completely questioning that I saw Mr. Yellowley waited for my answer.

“I am afraid, sir,” said I, looking at my watch, “if the emotions you speak of will occupy much time, we had better skip them, for it only wants a quarter to twelve.”

“We will omit them, then, Mr. Tramp; for, as you justly observe, they would require both time and space. Well, sir, to be brief, 123 was the angel of the railroad.”

“The lady you met at – ”

“Yes, sir, if you prefer to call her the lady; for I shall persist in my previous designation. Oh, Mr. Tramp, that was the great moment of my life. You may have remarked that we pass from era to era of our existence, as though it were from one chamber to another. The gay, the sparkling, and the brilliant succeed to the dark and gloomy apartment, scarce illumined by a ray of hope, and we move on in our life’s journey, with new objects suggesting new actions, and the actions engendering new frames of thought, and we think ourselves wiser as our vicissitudes grow thicker; but I must not continue this theme. To me, this moment was the greatest transition of my life. Here was the ideal before me, which neither art had pictured, nor genius described, – the loveliest creature I ever beheld. She turned round on taking her place, and with a slight gesture of surprise recognized me at once as her former fellow-traveller. I have had proud moments in my life, Mr. Tramp. I shall never forget how the Commander of the Forces at Boulahcush said to me in full audience, in the presence of all the officials, —