The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 10, No. 288, Supplementary Number

by Various

FRIENDSHIP'S OFFERING.

To begin with the exterior, which is somewhat novel in taste, the proprietors seem to have united the utile cum dulci, by substituting for the usual paper covering, an elegantly embossed leather binding. This is altogether an improvement on the original plan, since the slight coverings of silk or paper is scarcely safe out of the drawing-room or boudoir, and some of the contributions to the "annuals" entitle them to a higher stand. The presentation plate of the present Offering is a chaste and classical specimen of a kind of gold enamel engraving; The Sylph, engraved by Humphreys, is a pleasing picture; Virginia Water, from a picture by Daniell, is a delightful scene of rural repose; a Sculpture Group, by Fry; a View of Bombay; and the Captive Slave, by Finden; among the embellishments, are entitled to our commendatory notice.

The present editor is Mr. Charles Knight, who, according to his preface, succeeded "at an advanced period of the year to the duties which had previously been performed by a gentleman of acknowledged taste and ability." This may account for the imperfect state of some of the engravings; but the apology is not so requisite for the execution of the literary portion of the present volume. Our extracts must be short, for we have other claimants to our attention. The Housekeepers, a Shandean extract, is from one of the best prose contributors:—

There were two heavy, middle-aged merchants; they were either Dutch or German, I know not which, but their name was Vanderclump. Most decided old bachelors they were, with large, leathern, hanging cheeks, sleepy grey eyes, and round shoulders. They were men not given to much speech, but great feeders; and, when waited upon, would point clumsily to what they wanted, and make a sort of low growl, rather than be at the trouble to speak. These Messrs. Vanderclump were served by two tall, smooth-faced dawdles; I never could discover which held the superior station in the ménage. Each has been seen trotting home from market with a basket on her arm; each might be observed to shake a duster out of the upper windows; each would, occasionally, carry a huge bunch of keys, or wait at table during dinner; and, in the summer evenings, when it was not post-day, both of them would appear, dressed alike, sitting at work at the lower counting-house window, with the blinds thrown wide open. Both, I suppose, were housekeepers.

It happened, one cold, foggy spring, that the younger brother, Mr. Peter Vanderclump, left London to transact some business of importance with a correspondent at Hamburgh, leaving his brother Anthony to the loneliness of their gloomy house in St. Mary Axe. Week after week passed away, and Mr. Peter was still detained at Hamburgh. Who would have supposed that his society could have been missed? that the parlour could have seemed more dismally dull by the absence of one of those from whom it chiefly derived its character of dulness? Mr. Anthony took up his largest meerchaum, and enveloped himself in its smoke by the hour; but the volumes of smoke cleared away, and no Peter Vanderclump appeared emerging from the mist. Mr. Anthony brought some of his heavy folios from below; and, in their pages of interest, (no common, but often compound, interest,) lost, for awhile, the dreary sense of loneliness. But, a question was to be asked! Peter's solemn "yah" or "nien" was waited for in vain. Forgetful, and almost impatient, Anthony looked up—the chair was unoccupied which his brother had constantly filled.

Mr. Anthony began to sigh—he got into a habit of sighing. Betty and Molly (they were soft-hearted baggages) felt for their master—pitied their poor master! Betty was placing the supper on the table one evening, when her master sighed very heavily. Betty sighed also, and the corners of her mouth fell—their eyes met—something like a blush crimsoned Betty's sleek, shining cheek, when, on raising her eyes again, her master was still staring at her. Betty simpered, and, in her very soft, very demure voice ventured to say, "Was there any thing she could do?" Mr. Vanderclump rose up from his chair. Betty, for the first time, felt awed by his approach. "Batee!" he said, "my poor Batee! Hah! you are a goot girl!" He chucked her under the chin with his large hand. Betty looked meek, and blushed, and simpered again. There was a pause—Mr. Vanderclump was the first to disturb it. "Hah! hah!" he exclaimed, gruffly, as if suddenly recollecting himself; and, thrusting both hands into his capacious breeches-pockets, he sat down to supper, and took no further notice of Betty that night.

The next morning, the sun seemed to have made a successful struggle with the dense London atmosphere, and shone full in Mr. Vanderclump's face while he was at breakfast, and set a piping bullfinch singing a tune, which his master loved rather for the sake of old associations, than from any delight in music. Then Lloyd's List was full of arrivals, and the Price Current had that morning some unusual charm about it, which I cannot even guess at. Mr. Vanderclump looked upon the bright and blazing fire; his eye rested, with a calm and musing satisfaction, on the light volumes of steam rising from the spout of the tea-kettle, as it stood, rather murmuring drowsily, than hissing, upon the hob. There was, he might have felt, a sympathy between them. They were both placidly puffing out the warm and wreathing smoke.

He laid down his pipe, and took half a well-buttered muffin into his capacious mouth at a bite; he washed the mouthful down, with a large dish of tea, and he felt in better spirits. That morning he entered the counting-house rubbing his hands.

Within an hour a crowd of huge, dusky clouds shut out the merry sunshine, and the Hamburgh mail brought no tidings whatever of Mr. Peter. Mr. Anthony worked himself up into a thorough ill-humour again, and swore at his clerks, because they asked him questions. When he entered his apartment that evening he felt more desolate than ever. Betty placed a barrel of oysters on the table—he heeded her not;—a large German sausage—his eyes were fixed on the ground;—a piece of Hamburgh beef —Mr. Vanderclump looked up for an instant, and, Europa-like, his thoughts crossed the sea, upon that beef, to Hamburgh. Gradually, however, a genial warmth spread throughout the room, for Betty stirred up the fire, and let down the curtains, and snuffed the dim candles; while Molly loaded the table with bottles of divers shapes and sizes, a basin of snow-white sugar, and a little basket of limes, of well-known and exquisite flavour; placing, at the same time, a very small kettle of boiling water on the fire.—"Why, Mollee! my goot girl!" said Mr. Vanderclump, in a low and somewhat melancholy tone, (his eyes had mechanically followed these latter proceedings,) "Mollee! that is ponch!" —"La, sir! and why not?" replied the damsel, almost playfully. "Why not be comfortable and cheery? I am sure"—and here she meant to look encouraging, her usual simper spreading to a smile—"I am sure Betty and I would do our best to make you so."

"Goot girls, goot girls!" said Mr. Vanderclump, his eyes fixed all the while upon the supper-table—he sat down to it. "My goot girls!" said he, soon after, "you may go down; I do not want you; you need not wait." The two timid, gentle creatures instantly obeyed. More than an hour elapsed, and then Mr. Vanderclump's bell rang. The two matronly maidens were very busily employed in making a new cap. Betty rose at once; but suddenly recollecting that she had been trying on her new and unfinished cap, and had then only a small brown cotton skull-cap on her head, she raised both her hands to her head to be certain of this, and then said, "Do, Molly, there's a dear! answer the bell; for such a figure as I am, I could not go before master, no how. See, I have unpicked this old cap for a little bit of French edging at the back." Molly looked a little peevish; but her cap was on her head, and up stairs she went. Mr. Vanderclump was sitting before the fire, puffing lustily from his eternal pipe. "Take away," he said abruptly, "and put the leetle table here." He pointed and growled, and the sagacious Molly understood. She placed the table beside him, and upon it the punch, which he had been drinking. "Batee, my poor Batee!" said Mr. Vanderclump, who had not yet noticed that Betty was absent. "It is not Betty, but Molly, sir!" replied the latter damsel, in a voice of childlike simplicity. "Hah!" said he, apparently considering for a moment, "Hah! Batee, Mollee, all the same! Mollee, my poor Mollee, you are a goot girl! Get up to-morrow morning, my poor Mollee, and put on your best gown, and I will marry you!" Molly, was, as she afterwards declared, struck all of a heap. She gaped, and gasped with astonishment; and then a power of words were rushing and racing up her throat to her tongue's end: a glance at her master stopped their explosion. His hands were in his pockets, his face towards the fire, his pipe in his mouth. "Yes, sir," she replied, humbly and distinctly. A few tears trickled down her cheeks, as she curtseyed low at the door, and disappeared. She knew his ways, she thought within herself, as she walked very slowly down the stairs, and she congratulated herself that she had not risked another word in reply. "And now, Betty," she said, as she entered the kitchen, "I'll put the finishing stitch to my cap, and go to bed, for master will want nothing more to-night." She sat down quietly to work, and conversed quietly with Betty, not disclosing a word of her new prospects, Betty, however, observed that she took off the trimming with which her new cap had been already half-adorned. "Why, bless me, Molly!" she cried, "you are not going to put on that handsome white satin bow, are you?"—"Why, yes! I think I shall," replied Molly, "for now I look at your cap, with that there yellow riband upon it, mine seems to me quite old-maidish."

The next morning, Molly got up before her sister, and put on her best gown and her new cap. The morning was dark and dull, and Betty was sleepy, and Molly kept the window-curtain and the bed-curtains closely drawn. Unsuspected, she slipped out of the chamber, her shawl and her bonnet in her hand.

As the clock struck eight, Molly was standing beside her master before the rails of the marriage-altar; and, not long after, she burst upon the astonished eyes of her sister, as Mrs. Vanderclump.

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La Villegiatura is a pleasant article; but we do not think there is much of the "love of pastoral associations" left in the English character, and we are sorry for it. The Rustic Wreath, by Miss Mitford, is very sweet; the Cacadore, a story of the peninsular war, is a soul-stirring narrative; there is much pleasantry in Mrs. Hofland's Comforts of Conceitedness; Virginia Water, by the editor, could hardly be written by his fireside—it has too much local inspiration in every line; Auguste de Valcour, by the author of Gilbert Earle, is in his usual felicitous vein of philosophic melancholy; Miss Roberts has a glittering Tale of Normandy; the Orphans, by the editor, is simple and pathetic; Palinodia we subjoin:—

There was a time when I could feel

All passion's hopes and fears,

And tell what tongues can ne'er reveal,

By smiles, and sighs, and tears.

The days are gone! no more, no more,

The cruel fates allow;

And, though I'm hardly twenty-four,

I'm not a lover now.

Lady, the mist is on my sight,

The chill is on my brow;

My day is night, my bloom is blight—

I'm not a lover now!

I never talk about the clouds,

I laugh at girls and boys,

I'm growing rather fond of crowds,

And very fond of noise;

I never wander forth alone

Upon the mountain's brow;

I weighed, last winter, sixteen stone,—

I'm not a lover now!

I never wish to raise a veil,

I never raise a sigh;

I never tell a tender tale,

I never tell a lie;

I cannot kneel as once I did;

I've quite forgot my bow;

I never do as I am bid,—

I'm not a lover now!

I make strange blunders every day,

If I would be gallant,

Take smiles for wrinkles, black for grey.

And nieces for their aunt;

I fly from folly, though it flows

From lips of loveliest glow;

I don't object to length of nose,—

I'm not a lover now!

The muse's steed is very fleet—

I'd rather ride my mare;

The poet hunts a quaint conceit—

I'd rather hunt a hare;

I've learnt to utter yours and you

Instead of thine and thou;

And oh! I can't endure a Blue!—

I'm not a lover now!

I find my Ovid dry,

My Petrarch quite a pill,

Cut Fancy for Philosophy,

Tom Moore for Mr. Mill;

And belles may read, and beaux may write,

I care not who or how;

I burnt my album Sunday night,—

I'm not a lover now!

I don't encourage idle dreams

Of poison or of ropes,

I cannot dine on airy schemes,

I cannot sup on hopes:

New milk, I own is very fine,

Just foaming from the cow;

But yet I want my pint of wine,—

I'm not a lover now!

When Laura sings young hearts away,

I'm deafer than the deep;

When Leonora goes to play,

I sometimes go to sleep;

When Mary draws her white gloves out,

I never dance, I vow:

"Too hot to kick one's heels about!"—

I'm not a lover now!

I'm busy now with state affairs,

I prate of Pitt and Fox;

I ask the price of rail-road shares,

I watch the turns of stocks:

And this is life! no verdure blooms

Upon the withered bough.

I save a fortune in perfumes,—

I'm not a lover now!

I may be yet what others are,

A boudoir's babbling fool;

The flattered star of bench or har,

A party's chief or tool:

Come shower or sunshine, hope or fear,

The palace or the plough—

My heart and lute are broken here,—

I'm not a lover now!

Lady, the mist is on my sight,

The chill is on my brow;

My day is night, my bloom is blight,—

I'm not a lover now!

The First Ball, by L.E.L. is rife and gay; which, with Mr. Croker's Three Advices, are all we can spare room to point out to our readers.

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