Sir John Drinkwater is Eccentric.
“You’re an old fool, Burdon, and it’s all your fault.”
That’s what Sir John said, as he shook his Malacca cane at me; and I suppose it was my fault; but then, how could I see what was going to happen?
It began in 1851. I remember it so well because that was the year of the Great Exhibition, and Sir John treated me to a visit there; and when I’d been and was serving breakfast next morning, he asked me about it, and laughed and asked me if I’d taken much notice of the goldsmiths’ work. I said I had, and that it was a great mistake to clean gold plate with anything but rouge.
“Why?” he said.
Because, I told him, if any of the plate-powder happened to be left in the cracks, if it was rouge it gave a good effect; but if it was a white preparation, it looked dirty and bad.
“Then we’ll have all the chests open to-morrow, James Burdon,” he said; “and you shall give the old gold plate a good clean up with rouge, and I’ll help you.”
“You, Sir John?”
He nodded. And the very next day he sent all the other servants to the Exhibition, came down to my pantry, opened the plate-room, and put on an apron just like a servant would, and helped me to clean that gold plate. He got tired by one o’clock, and sat down upon a chair and looked at it all glistening as it was spread out on the dresser and shelves—some bright with polishing, some dull and dead and ancient-looking. Cups and bowls and salvers and round dishes covered with coats of arms; some battered and bent, and some as perfect as on the day it left the goldsmith’s hands.
I’d worked hard—as hard as I could, for sneezing, for I was doing that half the time, just as if I had a bad cold. For every cup or dish was kept in a green baize bag that fitted in one of the old ironbound oak chests, and these chests were lined with green baize. And all this being exceedingly old, the moths had got in; and pounds and pounds of pepper had been scattered about the baize, to keep them away.