“Ad ogni conoscenza bruni:” Dark to all recognition! So they would have it indeed, true of instinct. “Ce serait l’inquisition,” screamed the Senate of France, threatened with income-tax and inquiry into their ways and means. Well,—what better thing could it be? Had they not been blind long enough, under their mole-hillocks, that they should shriek at the first spark of “Inquisition”? A few things might be “inquired,” one should think, and answered, among honest men, now, to advantage, and openly? “Ah no—for God’s sake,” shrieks the Senate, “no Inquisition. If ever anybody should come to know how we live, we were disgraced for ever, honest gentlemen that we are.”
Now, my friends, the first condition of all bravery is to keep out of this loathsomeness. If you do live by rapine, stand up like a man for the old law of bow and spear; but don’t fall whimpering down on your belly, like Autolycus, “grovelling on the ground,” when another human creature asks you how you get your daily bread, with an “Oh, that ever I was born,—here is inquisition come on me!”
The Inquisition must come. Into men’s consciences, no; not now: there is little worth looking into there. But into their pockets—yes; a most practicable and beneficial inquisition, to be made thoroughly and purgatorially, once for all, and rendered unnecessary hereafter, by furnishing the relieved marsupialia with—glass pockets, for the future.
You know, at least, that we, in our own society, are to have glass pockets, as we are all to give the tenth of what we have, to buy land with, so that we must every one know each other’s property to a farthing. And this month I begin making up my own accounts for you, as I said I would: I could not, sooner, though I set matters in train as soon as my first letter was out, and effected (as I supposed!), in February, a sale of 14,000l. worth of houses, at the West End, to Messrs. —— and ——, of —— Row.
But from then till now, I’ve been trying to get that piece of business settled, and until yesterday, 19th July, I have not been able.
For, first there was a mistake made by my lawyer in the list of the houses: No. 7 ought to have been No. 1. It was a sheer piece of stupidity, and ought to have been corrected by a dash of the pen; but all sorts of deeds had to be made out again, merely that they might be paid for; and it took about three months to change 7 into 1.
At last all was declared smooth again, and I thought I should get my money; but Messrs. —— never stirred. My people kept sending them letters, saying I really did want the money, though they mightn’t think it. Whether they thought it or not, they took no notice of any such informal communications. I thought they were going to back out of their bargain; but my man of business at last got their guarantee for its completion.
“If they’ve guaranteed the payment, why don’t they pay?” thought I; but still I couldn’t get any money. At last I found the lawyers on both sides were quarrelling over the stamp-duties! Nobody knew, of the whole pack of them, whether this stamp or that was the right one! and my lawyers wouldn’t give an eighty-pound stamp, and theirs wouldn’t be content with a twenty-pound one.
Now, you know, all this stamp business itself is merely Mr. Gladstone’s[5] way of coming in for his share of the booty. I can’t be allowed to sell my houses in peace, but Mr. Gladstone must have his three hundred pounds out of me, to feed his Woolwich infant with, and fire it off “with the most satisfactory result,” “nothing damaged but the platform.”
I am content, if only he would come and say what he wants, and take it, and get out of my sight. But not to know what he does want! and to keep me from getting my money at all, while his lawyers are asking which is the right stamp? I think he had better be clear on that point next time.