Memoirs of a London doll

by R. H. Horne

I Was So Frightened! I Thought He Would Break Something Off Me!

But the last thing done to me was by Mr. Sprat himself, whose funny, white face and round eyes I could now see. He turned me about and about in his hands, examining and trying my legs and arms, which he moved backwards and forwards, and up and down, to my great terror, and fixed my limbs in various attitudes. I was so frightened! I thought he would break something off me. However, nothing happened, and when he was satisfied that I was a complete doll in all parts, he hung me up on a line that ran along the room overhead, extending from one wall to the other, and near to the two beams that also extended from wall to wall. I hung upon the line to dry, in company with many other dolls, both boys and girls, but mostly girls. The tops of the beams were also covered with dolls, all of whom, like those on the lines, were waiting there till their paint or varnish had properly dried and hardened. I passed the time in observing what was going on in the room under my line, and also the contents of the room, not forgetting my numerous little companions, who were smiling and staring, or sleeping, round about me.

Mr. Sprat was a doll-maker only; he never made doll’s clothes. He said that was not work for an artist like him. So in about a week, when I was properly dry, and the varnish of my complexion thoroughly hardened and like enamel, Mr. Sprat took me down—examined me all over for the last time—and then, nodding his head to himself several times, with a face of seriousness and satisfaction, as much as to say, ‘You are a doll fit in all respects for the most polished society,’—he handed me to his wife, who wrapped me up in silver paper, all but the head, and laying me in a basket among nine others, papered up in the same way, she carried me off to a large doll-shop not far from the corner of New Turnstile in High Holborn.

CHAPTER II
MY FIRST MAMMA

I arrived safe at the doll-shop, and Mrs. Sprat took me out of the basket with her finger and thumb, keeping all her other fingers spread out, for fear of soiling my silver paper.

‘Place all these dolls on the shelf in the back parlor,’ said the master of the shop. ‘I have no room yet for them in the window.’ As I was carried to the shelf, I caught a glimpse of the shop-window! What a bright and confused sensation it gave me! Everything seemed so light and merry and numerous! And then, through all this crowd of many shapes and colors, packed and piled and hanging up in the window, I saw the crowds of large walking people passing outside in the world, which was as yet perfectly unknown to me! Oh, how I longed to be placed in the shop-window! I felt I should learn things so fast, if I could only see them. But I was placed in a dark box, among a number of other dolls, for a long time, and when I was taken out I was laid upon my back upon a high shelf, with my rosy cheeks and blue eyes turned towards the ceiling.

Yet I cannot say that the time I passed on this shelf was by any means lost or wasted. I thought of all I had seen in Mr. Sprat’s room, and all I had heard them talk about, which gave me many very strange and serious thoughts about the people who lived in the world only for the purpose, as I supposed, of buying dolls. The conversation of Mr. Sprat with his family made me very naturally think this; and in truth I have never since been quite able to fancy but that the principal business of mankind was that of buying and selling dolls and toys. What I heard the master of the shop in Holborn often say helped to fix this early impression on my mind.

But the means by which I learned very much of other things and other thoughts was by hearing the master’s little girl Emmy read aloud to her elder sister. Emmy read all sorts of pretty books, every word of which I eagerly listened to, and felt so much interested, and so delighted, and so anxious and curious to hear more. She read pretty stories of little boys and girls, and affectionate mammas and aunts, and kind old nurses, and birds in the fields and woods, and flowers in the gardens and hedges; and then such beautiful fairy tales; and also pretty stories in verse; all of which gave me great pleasure, and were indeed my earliest education. There was the lovely book called ‘Birds and Flowers,’ by Mary Howitt; the nice stories about ‘Willie,’ by Mrs. Marcett; the delightful little books of Mrs. Harriet Myrtle,—in which I did so like to hear about old Mr. Dove, the village carpenter, and little Mary, and the account of May Day, and the Day in the Woods,—and besides other books, there was oh! such a story-book called ‘The Good-natured Bear!’ But I never heard any stories about dolls, and what they thought, or what happened to them! This rather disappointed me. Living at a doll-shop, and hearing the daughter of the master of such a wonderful shop reading so often, I naturally expected to have heard more about dolls than any other creatures! However, on the whole, I was very well contented, and should have been perfectly happy if they would only have hung me up in the shop-window! What I wanted was to be placed in the bright window, and to look into the astonishing street!