(SECOND LETTER.—B.)
The Magnum Opus.
À propos of this heading, what a treasure a Magnum Opal would be. This remark is only "by the way." My motto is Business First, Play (on words) afterwards. So to work.
I really think I shall take to Guide-book writing. Grandolph's Guides would be immensely popular. I'm sure I can do it—for upon my word I can do a'most anything if I only buckle to. By the way, 'Buckle' suggests history. Can go in for "making history" when I've done this work. WILLIAMS—not MONTAGU the Magistrate—(good title this for something)—but my friend the Companionable Captain —— is at work; when he has done, he reads out a few descriptive paragraphs for my approbation, or the contrary. When I nod it means that I like it; when I don't nod, he has to wait till I do. I generally begin nodding about the middle of the first paragraph.
"Well," says he, the other day, quite suddenly, "I'm glad you like it all so much."
"Like all what?" I exclaimed, blowing the cigar-ash off my pyjamas, and wondering to myself how I could have been so absorbed in his reading aloud as to have let my half-smoked havannah tumble on to the floor.
"Why, all I've been reading to you for the last hour and a half," returned the Captain, apparently somewhat annoyed; peppery chap, the Captain,—'Curried' Captain when on board Sir DONALD's boat,—but to resume. Says the Curried Captain, still a bit annoyed, "You passed all the paragraphs, one after the other, and whenever I stopped to ask you how you liked it, you nodded."
I didn't like to hurt the gallant scribe's feelings, but the fact is that he, as a reader, has a very soothing-syrupy tone and, I fancy, that in less than a quarter of an hour, judging by the moiety of my cigar. I must have fallen fast asleep.
"That's posted, is it?" I ask, evading further explanation. "It is," he answers. "But I've got another lot—"
"Good!" I interrupt him, rather abruptly I own, but, from experience I say it, if I don't take myself when in the humour—'on the hop,' so to speak, as they said of the scarabæus in Kent—(trust me for natural history and plenty of it)—I'm no use at all. Now at this moment I am wide awake, a giant refreshed; so I light another fragrant weed, and call for another cool drink, as I haven't the smallest idea what became of the one I ordered when the Gallant Graphist commenced reading; I rather suspect he 'put it to his lips when so dispoged,' and that, in this instance also, he mistook my nod for silent but emphatic encouragement.
"Now," I say to the Amiable Amanuensis and Adaptable Author, "you read your stuff aloud with emphasis and discretion, and I'll chuck in the ornamental part. Excuse me, that's my drink," I say, with an emphasis on the possessive pronoun, for the Soldierly Scribe, in a moment of absorption, was about to apply that process to my liquor. He apologises handsomely, and commences his recital. In the absence of a gong,—one ought never to travel without a gong,—I whack the tea-tray with a paper-knife. "All in to begin!"
"The mail train," &c., &c. I make my notes, and remark that MURRAY and BRADSHAW lost a great chance in not having long ago secured the services of the Corresponding Captain. "The railroad passes through mountain scenery of exceptional," &c., &c. BRADSHAW and MURRAY, not to mention BAEDEKER and BLACK, absolutely not in it with the Wandering Warrior. "About thirty miles from Cape Town"—
A SIMPLE SUGGESTION.
I stop him at this point. "Couldn't we have a song here?"
"Why?" asks the Simple Soldier, glaring at me, and pulling his moustache.
"Just to lighten it up a bit," I explain. "You see 'About thirty miles' and so forth, suggests the old song of Within a Mile of Edinboro' Town."
"Don't see it," says the Virtuous Veteran, stolidly.
"Well, I'll make a note of it," and I add pleasantly, as is my way, "if it's a song, I'll make several notes of it."
"Um!" growls the Severe Soldier, and once again I defeat him in an attempt at surprising my outpost, i.e., my tumbler of cool drink. He apologises gruffly but politely, and then continues his reading.
ON WE GOES AGAIN.
He continues to read about "distances," "so many feet above sea-levels," "engineering skill," &c., &c., which I observe to him will all make capital padding for a guide-book, when I am suddenly struck by the sound of the word I had just used, viz., 'padding.'
PADDINGTON.
"By Jove!" I exclaim.
"What is it?" asks the Confused Captain, looking up from his MS.
"'Padding,'" I reply—"Only add a 'ton' to it, and that will give it just the weight I require. Don't you see?" I ask him, impetuously. But he merely shakes his head, and lugs at his moustache. I explain the idea, as if it were a charade. I say, "The whole notion is 'padding—ton.' See?"
The Ruminating Reader thinks it won't do. "Yes it will," I urge—"it will lighten it up. Who wants statistics without anecdote? Now for an anecdote; and I knock one off, sur le champ, about the engine-driver, the stoker, and several other persons, all on the look-out for promotion, informing me of their being Paddington men of considerable political influence at home. The Cautious Captain accepts the anecdote, interpolates it, and after I have called for and imbibed another tumbler of 'my own partik,' and lighted another cigar, the Conscientious Captain resumes his entertainment."
NO PIANO.
He reads on. Another drink, just to rivet my attention. Will he take something? No? Then I will. His health, and song—I mean 'treatise,' or whatever he calls it—say 'lecture.' Wish we'd had a piano. Never will travel without one again. Mem.—Gong and piano. I don't pretend to be a thorough musician, but as a one-fingered player I'd give Sir CHARLES HALLÉ odds and beat him. Now then—let's see where were we. Another tumbler iced. Good. Allez! Captain, go ahead!
Somehow or another, after this—that is, I can only time it by the fact of my having called for a fourth or fifth glass of iced drink, or it may have been my half-dozenth, for time does fly so,—the Captain having, I suspect, drank the greater part of the previous one whenever I didn't happen to be looking that way—I begin to think I must have once more given my assent by nodding to a lot of stuff of which I could not nave heard more than three pages, as, when I arouse myself from my reverie, the tumbler is empty, the Captain has gone out, and so has my cigar.
AWAY! AWAY!
"Action is the word!" said I, suddenly jumping up; and, having seized a spade, and provided myself with a large sack, which I carried across my shoulders, I set off for the diamond-fields. Unrecognised by a soul, I went to work on my own account; and the brilliant things I saw—far more brilliant than even the witticisms of WOLFFY, or the sarcasms of ARTHUR B! Into my sack go thousands of diamonds! The sack is full! Aladdin and the Lamp not in it with me! "Hallo!" shouts a voice, gruffly. I could see no one. "Vox et præterea nil," as we used to say at Eton. Suddenly I felt myself collared. I made a gallant attempt at resistance. A spade is a spade I know, but what is a spade and one against twenty with pistols and daggers, headed by the redoubtable Filliblusterer THOMAS TIDDLER himself? "Strip him!" said T.T., shortly.
Will you believe that the only way in which in this country they arrive at implicitly believing every word you utter, is by denuding you of all your clothes, so as to get at the naked truth, holding you up by the heels for the purpose of shaking the diamonds out of you, in case any are concealed in your hair, mouth, ears, eyes and so forth.
"He has diamonds on the brain!" I hear some ruffian exclaim, and in another second—
Well—what happened I cannot tell you: I must have fainted. When I came to myself I was lying by the chair in which I had been previously sitting when listening to the Captain's reading, and bending over me with a glass of water in his hand, was the faithful and clever Doctor whose companionship on this voyage of discovery I am daily and hourly learning to appreciate at its proper value. I fancy the ship's crew were round about me, with the Engineer and the Chaplain. I feel inclined to say, "HARDY, HARDY, kiss me, HARDY!" and then something about "Tell them at home"—but the words stick in my throat, as they did in Macbeth's throat (only they were other words) when he was on his throat-sticking expedition. (Little Shakspearian reference thrown in here, and no extra charge.)
"How many of these has he had?" I hear the Doctor say, and I perceived that he was holding up an empty tumbler. I should like to explain that, as we were engaged in composition, there had been 'composing draughts.' I fancy I caught the tone of the Clever Captain's voice in reply, but the next minute I felt myself being lifted up and carried off. I wished to tell them of my strange adventure, and how I had barely escaped with my life, but somehow drowsiness overcame me, and I must have fallen asleep.
BUSINESS AS BEFORE.
To-day I sit down to write out this strange story. Once I asked the Cautious Captain and the Doubting Doctor "if they had seen anything of my pickaxe and the sack of diamonds." But they only smiled at one another, elevated their eyebrows, then winked, and laughed.
What is their little game?
No matter. I will lie low. My motto is "Diamonds are trumps." I'm not here as Aladdin for nothing. "Aha!" as the old melodramatic villain used to say, "a time will come! No mattar!"
RATHER CURRIE-OUS!
I don't know whether it is owing to my voyage in a DONALD CURRIE steamer—'twas the first opportunity that ever I had of tasting a DONALD CURRIE, and excellent it is, as of course, was all our "board" on board—(send this joke to WOLFFY—he'll work it up and make a real impromptu sparkler of it—and I don't grudge him the kudos of it, not one little bit)—or to the change of air, but I am bound to say openly that I do think the G.O.M. has been right about most things, especially about Majuba (who was Pa JUBA? Send this to DRUMMY WOLFFY), and—well, I shall have more to say on this subject. If this meets the eye of any friendly person, will he kindly remember me to my Uncle? Thanks. That's the ticket. More anon.
