That evening, whilst we were at dinner, a parcel came, with a letter for me, which, on opening, proved to be from those dear, sweet girls, the two Misses B—yl—s’s, saying “they would feel much obliged if I would present the accompanying article to one who would call for it in a day or two.” On undoing the parcel, I declare if it wasn’t a beautiful white satin pincushion, with a superb lace border, while on it was printed in pins—
WELCOME
LITTLE STRANGER.
This, of course, was fine nuts to crack for Mr. Edward; who must go cutting his stupid jokes upon a subject which as I told him at the time, I thought would be much better left alone. But there was no stopping him; and he wanted to send out for a pennyworth of baby-pins, and put an s to the stranger—saying that the Misses B—yl—s’s had sent it to me only half-finished.
On the 22nd of March, 1841, the following advertisement appeared in the Times and the Morning Post:—“On the 20th instant, at Duvernay Villa, P—rk V—ll—ges, R—g—nt’s P—rk, the lady of Edward Sk—n—st—n, Esq., of a daughter.” And quite early on the morning of the day mentioned in the advertisement, anybody passing our house might have seen my dear mother tying up our knocker with a white kid glove.
My baby was the loveliest tiddy ickle sing of a ducks-o’-diamonds that I think I ever saw in all my life—and, thank Heaven! all its little limbs were straight, and it hadn’t a single blemish upon it—if, indeed, I except some strange marks it had on one side of its beautiful little neck, and which I told nurse I was as certain as certain could be was a letter and some figures; for I could make out a perfect F, and a 4 and a 2, and when I cast it up in my own mind, I remembered this was exactly what that impudent, big-whiskered monkey of a policeman, who had frightened me so by winking at me, had got printed on the collar of his coat. At first, I was rather vexed that it wasn’t a boy; for, to tell the truth, I had set my heart upon having one. When, however, I came to turn it over in my mind, I wasn’t at all sorry that it was a girl, for she would be such a nice companion for me when she grew up, and, of course, would take all the trouble of the house off my hands. Besides, I do think boys are such Turks, and so difficult for a woman to manage, so that, as it was a mere toss-up between the two, I do think, if I had had a choice in the matter, I should have cried “woman” after all.
I wish any one could only have seen my dear, dear mother—I can assure them it really was a treat worth living for—sitting by the fireside, with my little unconscious angel lying in her lap, and pulling down its sweet little nose, so as to seduce it into symmetry. She told me the first duty a mother owed to her infant was to pay proper attention to its nose, as really, at that tender age, it was as plastic as putty, and could be drawn out just like so much india-rubber; indeed, Nature, she might say, seemed to have kindly placed the child’s nose in its mother’s hands, and left it for her to say whether the cherub should be blessed with an aquiline, or cursed with a snub. I had to thank herself, she said, for the shape of mine; for when I was born, she really had fears that it would take after my father, and his was a bottle; so that it was only by never neglecting my nasal organ for an instant, and devoting every spare minute she had to its growth and formation, that she had been able to rescue it from the strong likeness it had, at first, to my father’s. And she begged of me to carry this maxim with me to my grave—“That noses might be grown to any shape, like cucumbers; and that it was only for the mother to decide whether the infant nasal gherkin should be allowed to run wild, and twist itself into a ‘turn up,’ or should, by the process of cultivation, be forced to grow straight, and elongate itself into a Grecian.” And then the dear, good body informed me that, touching the dear cherub’s eyes, I should find they would require a great deal of looking after—indeed, quite as much as the nose; for all children naturally squinted, and she thought nothing on earth looked so dreadful and vulgar as to see a pair of eyes wanting to go different ways, for all the world like two perverse greyhounds coupled together; and she was convinced that goggle-eyes and swivel-eyes, and, in fact, every other variety of eye but the right, merely arose from bad nursing. Consequently, I ought to be very careful not to allow any nurse with even so much as a cast to enter my service, until my little dear had learnt to look straight before it. And, above all, I was to be very particular, for some time to come, never to permit my little petsy wetsy to look over its head, for fear its eyes should become fixed in that uncomfortable position, and I should have my poor little girl walking about with them always turned up like a methodist preacher. Then she begged of me, as I loved my baby, never to allow it to yawn without putting my hand under its chin, to prevent it dropping its jaw, or I should have the misery of seeing my eldest daughter going through the world with its mouth always open, like a carriage dog, or one of the French toy nut-crackers. Moreover, she said she hoped I would be very particular with the little darling’s little wee legs; for if I should be imprudent enough to rub them downwards, as sure as her name was B—ff—n, I should have the pleasure of seeing them in after life with no more calf to them than an ostrich’s; whereas, if I took care to rub them upwards every morning, then, when she grew up, I should have the satisfaction of beholding the dear with as fine a pair of legs as an opera-dancer, or, she might say, a fashionable footman. So that, by the time dear mother had finished her instruction, I plainly saw, from what she said, that Nature had not done half its duty to babies, but had sent them into the world with their joints as imperfectly put together as cheap furniture, and that if the greatest care wasn’t taken with them, they would be as certain to warp in all kinds of ways as any of the other articles which are puffed off as such temptations to persons about to marry.
My poor Edward was nearly out of his wits with joy at having such a beautiful child; and the stupid ninny would go giving Mrs. Toosypegs half a sovereign when she declared that it was the very image of its papa—and so the little angel was. But my gentleman must go cutting his stupid jokes again, and saying that as he missed a silver spoon down-stairs, he should like to know whether the child had been born with one in its mouth—which set Mrs. Toosypegs off laughing so violently, that she seemed to think that she might as well work out her half sovereign that way as any other. So, upon that, Mr. Edward went on, and said, that as it hadn’t been born with a silver spoon, perhaps it had with a Britannia metal one, which, he said, would be quite as lucky, as every one knew that it was a very good substitute for silver.
I was much gratified to hear a gentle ring at the street-door bell, which, I felt sure, was some one come to inquire after my health; and as Miss Susan was out, I told Mrs. Toosypegs to tell whoever it was that I had got a very fine little girl, and that we were going on as well as could be expected. When she came up again, she told me that it was a life guardsman, with tremendous big black mustachios, who said he was quite delighted to hear it; so I at once saw that it was none other than that dreadful amorous ogre of a Ned Twist, who was making such violent cupboard love to my maid; and I asked Mrs. Toosypegs whether she had ever noticed any strange goings on in the kitchen, and requested her, as a favour, to keep a sharp eye upon Susan. I felt satisfied, that now she had got me safe in bed, she would be carrying on fine games, and I should be having half the barracks at supper in my kitchen every night; so I begged of Mrs. Toosypegs, whenever she went down-stairs, to make a point of looking in the coal-cellar, saying that was the cage in which she stowed her Robbing Red-breasts—as Edward very cleverly calls them.
Mrs. Yapp, I regret to say, made herself very disagreeable throughout the whole business, and would have it that mother was conspiring against my daughter and myself to kill us. The fact was, they were both at daggers drawn about the way in which my baby and myself ought to be treated; for one was for bathing the little darling in cold water, and the other in warm; and the one for bandaging it up like a little mummy, and the other letting its beautiful little limbs be perfectly free. One would have it that the soothing syrup was really what it professed to be, a blessing to mothers, while the other declared that it was nothing more than a poison to children. As for myself, one said I could never get round if I didn’t have plenty of air, and the other vowed that I should never get up again if the room wasn’t kept as close as possible. Dear mother assured me that I could only gain strength by taking as much solid food as I could manage, while Mrs. Yapp persisted in telling me, that in my state I ought to take nothing but slops—at least, if I wanted to get well; and they used to pester the poor doctor so, whenever he came, that at last he took offence, and said, that as he saw that I was in very good hands, he thought his services were no longer required. Somehow or other, Mrs. Toosypegs seemed to agree with everybody; so that I could not tell what on earth to do. Every day at dinner there was a regular fight at my bedside; for mother would insist upon my just taking a mouthful of the lean of a mutton-chop that she had cooked for me, while Mrs. Yapp declared that it would be the death of me, and would stand begging and praying of me to try a spoonful or two of her nice gruel—so, between the two, I couldn’t get either any rest or food, for they neither would allow me to touch what the other recommended. And I do verily believe, if it hadn’t been for Mrs. Toosypegs giving me, on the sly, whatever I took a fancy to, I must, positively and truly, have been starved to death.
Directly the little cherub of a baby, too, used to cry, they both raced after each other up-stairs. One said it had got the wind, and the other the stomach-ache; and mother prescribed a spoonful of dill-water with some sugar, while the other stood out for as much rhubarb and magnesia as would lie on a sixpence.