"I should think, very likely," I replied; "just the sort of man who would be Tom Thornton—has a broad face, with a colour, and wears a spotted neckcloth; Tom—what could his name be but Tom?"
"Is he about five-and-thirty?" asked Vincent, "rather short, and with reddish coloured hair and whiskers?"
"Precisely," said I; "are not all Toms alike?"
"Ah," said Vincent, "I know him well: he is a clever, shrewd fellow, but a most unmitigated rascal. He is the son of a steward in Lancashire, and received an attorney's education; but being a humorous, noisy fellow, he became a great favourite with his father's employer, who was a sort of Mecaenas to cudgel players, boxers, and horse jockies. At his house, Thornton met many persons of rank, but of a taste similar to their host's: and they, mistaking his vulgar coarseness for honesty, and his quaint proverbs for wit, admitted him into their society. It was with one of them that I have seen him. I believe of late, that his character has been of a very indifferent odour: and whatever has brought him among the English at Paris—those white-washed abominations—those 'innocent blacknesses,' as Charles Lamb calls chimney sweepers, it does not argue well for his professional occupations. I should think, however, that he manages to live here; for wherever there are English fools, there are fine pickings for an English rogue."
"Ay," said I, "but are there enough fools here, to feed the rogues?"
"Yes, because rogues are like spiders, and eat each other, when there is nothing else to catch; and Tom Thornton is safe, as long as the ordinary law of nature lasts, that the greater knave preys on the lesser, for there cannot possibly be a greater knave than he is. If you have made his acquaintance, my dear Pelham, I advise you most soberly to look to yourself, for if he doth not steal, beg, or borrow of you, Mr. Howard de Howard will grow fat, and even Mr. Aberton cease to be a fool. And now, most noble Pelham, farewell. Il est plus aise d'etre sage pour les autres que de l'etre pour soi-meme."
CHAPTER XXI.
This is a notable couple—and have met
But for some secret knavery.
—The Tanner of Tyburn.
I had now been several weeks in Paris, and I was not altogether dissatisfied with the manner in which they had been spent. I had enjoyed myself to the utmost, while I had, as much as possible, combined profit with pleasure; viz. if I went to the Opera in the evening, I learned to dance in the morning; if I drove to a soiree at the Duchesse de Perpignan's, it was not till I had fenced an hour at the Salon des Assauts d'Armes; and if I made love to the duchess herself it was sure to be in a position I had been a whole week in acquiring from my master of the graces; in short, I took the greatest pains to complete my education. I wish all young men who frequented the Continent for that purpose, could say the same.
One day (about a week after the conversation with Vincent, recorded in my last chapter) I was walking slowly along one of the paths in the Jardin des Plantes, meditating upon the various excellencies of the Rocher de Cancale and the Duchesse de Perpignan, when I perceived a tall man, with a thick, rough coat, of a dark colour (which I recognized long before I did the face of the wearer) emerging from an intersecting path. He stopped for a few moments, and looked round as if expecting some one. Presently a woman, apparently about thirty, and meanly dressed, appeared in an opposite direction. She approached him; they exchanged a few words, and then, the woman taking his arm, they struck into another path, and were soon out of sight. I suppose that the reader has already discovered that this man was Thornton's companion in the Bois de Boulogne, and the hero of the Salon de Jeu, in the Palais Royal. I could not have supposed that so noble a countenance, even in its frowns, could ever have wasted its smiles upon a mistress of that low station to which the woman who had met him evidently belonged. However, we all have our little foibles, as the Frenchman said, when he boiled his grandmother's head in a pipkin.