But although he had secured his solitude from interruption by a person likely to interest him too keenly, he was not equally resolute, or equally successful, in keeping himself aloof from certain fellow-travellers with whom he had scarce one thought or one taste in common. Our readers may remember a young lady whom we attempted to describe, figuring not very advantageously at the ball-room at Brussels. This damsel belonged to a mamma who, in her own way, was a still greater oddity, and who, indeed, ought to be made responsible for the grotesque appearance of her daughter on that occasion. She insisted upon it that, as all the world knew they were travellers, just looking in, as it were, as they were passing through the town, they might very well go to the ball in their travelling dresses; and as she was one of those who held rigidly to the prudent maxim that “any thing was good enough to travel in,” these dresses were not likely, be the occasion what it might, to be remarkable for their freshness.
Mrs. Jackson was the widow of a citizen of London who had lately died, leaving her and her daughter a very ample fortune. Now, although Mr. Jackson had, ever since his marriage, been adding hundred to hundred by the sale of wax and tallow candles in the city, yet had he continued to inhabit the same little house at Islington into which he had first packed himself with dear Mrs. Jackson immediately after the honeymoon; nor had he, in any one way, made an effort to enjoy his increasing income. An effort it would have been. What more did Mr. Jackson want? What more could he have enjoyed? The morning took him to his warehouse in the city, and the afternoon brought him back with an excellent appetite for an excellent dinner, and quite sufficiently fatigued to enjoy that comfortable digestive nap, in which Mrs. Jackson also joined him; and from which he woke up only the better prepared for the hearty slumbers of the night. His wealth, had he been obliged to spend it, would have added to his discomfort, instead of diffusing over him, as it did, a perpetual pleasant glow of self-importance. A larger and finer house, with the toil of receiving company in it, would have distressed him beyond measure. It was bad enough to be compelled, occasionally, to take his spouse to the theatre, or to a Christmas party: such enterprises were looked forward to with uneasy apprehension; and the gratification of having got over them was the only one they afforded him. His ledger—his newspaper—his dinner and a fireside, quiet but not solitary, this was the summary of his happiness. His little wine-glass, as Boswell would have expressed it, was quite full; you would only have made a mess of it, and spoilt all, by attempting to pour in a whole tumbler-full of happiness.
One daughter only had blessed the nuptials of Mr. and Mrs. Jackson. She was still at boarding-school when her father died. But, after this event, her fond mamma could no longer bear the separation; and home she came, bringing with her that accurate and complete stock of human knowledge and female accomplishments which is usually derived from such establishments, namely, infinite scraps of every thing and every thing in scraps, with the beginning of all languages, of all arts, and all sciences. There was in her portfolio a map of China, faithfully delineated, and a group of roses not quite so faithful. She had strummed one sonata till she played it with all the certainty of animal instinct, and she had acquired the capability of saying, “How d’ye do?” in at least three several languages beside the English.
But the loss of “Jackson” even the society of the accomplished Louisa could not compensate. The widow was very dull. Her comfortable house at Islington ceased to bring comfort to her; and she was tormented by a most unusual restlessness. Her daughter, who had heard from her favourite companion at the boarding-school, of the charms of foreign travel,—of the romantic adventures, and the handsome counts and barons that are sure to be encountered on the road, took advantage of this restlessness to persuade her mamma to take a tour on the Continent. After much discussion, much hesitation, infinite talking, and reading of guide-books, and exploring of maps—they started.
Absurd!—impossible!—exclaims the intelligent reader—that good Mrs. Jackson should commit herself and her daughter to all the casualties of travel without a male companion. And for what purpose? What pleasure could rocks and mountains, or statues and pictures, give to her, that would be worth the trouble of getting to them? Very absurd and quite impossible! we ourselves should, perhaps, have exclaimed, had we been inventing incidents, and not recording a mere sober matter of fact. But so it was. And, indeed, let any one call to mind the strange groups he has encountered—scrambling about the Continent, the Lord knows why or wherefore—and whatever difficulty he may have in explaining Mrs. Jackson’s motives, he will have none in believing her conduct, were it twice as absurd. Of pleasure, indeed, she had little, and very much tribulation. To be sure she felt quite at home upon the steam-boat on the Rhine;—“it did so remind her” of a trip she once took to Greenwich with the dear departed. And then it was very amusing and instructive to both herself and her daughter to find out all the places as they passed on that “Panorama of the Rhine” which lay extended on their laps before them. Being on the spot, they could study the map with singular advantage. But it was not always they had a map of the country to look at, nor even anyone to tell them the names of the places. The idea of seeing a place and not knowing its name!—this always put Mrs. Jackson in a perfect fever: as well, she would say, shake hands with the Lord Mayor, and not know it was the Lord Mayor! And then what she suffered who can tell, from the strange outlandish viands put before, and alas! too often put within her? and that daily affliction—imposed on her with such unnecessary cruelty—of eating her meat without vegetables, or her vegetables without meat?
Still on she went—bustling, elbowing, sighing, scolding, complaining—but nevertheless travelling on. Being at Rome, in the same hotel with Winston, and finding that he had answered one or two of her questions very civilly and satisfactorily, both she and her daughter had frequently applied to him in their difficulties. And these difficulties generally resulted from a lack of knowledge so easily supplied, that it would have been mere churlishness to withhold the necessary information.
These difficulties, however, seemed to increase rather than diminish with their sojourn at Rome; and well they might. Louisa Jackson found them the most convenient things imaginable. She had been all the way on the look-out for adventures, counts, and barons, and had hitherto met with nothing of the sort. But Alfred Winston was as handsome as any count need be—why not fall in love with him? A gentleman she was convinced he was; of wealth she had sufficient, and to do her justice, had quite generosity enough to be indifferent as to his possessions; and for the rest, she would let her eye, let her heart, choose for her. The brave Louisa! And her eye and her heart—which mean here pretty much the same thing—had made no bad selection. As she had mentally resolved to bestow herself, and all her “stocks, funds, and securities,” upon our hero, and as she had wit enough to see that her only hold upon him at present, was through his compassion for their embarrassments, she was determined to keep an ample supply of them on hand.
They came sometimes without being called for, and without the least collusion on her part. It was from no principle of economy, but from a curiosity which could not be gratified so well in any other manner, that Mrs. Jackson and her daughter occasionally ventured to thread their way on foot through the streets of Rome. On one of these expeditions they found themselves in the neighbourhood of the Pantheon. Opposite this building there is a sort of ambulatory market, outrivalling all other markets, at least in the commodity of noise—a commodity in which the populace of Rome generally abound. On approaching it you think some desperate affray is going on; but the men are only parading and vaunting their disgusting fish, or most uninviting vegetables. The merits of these they proclaim with a perfect storm of vociferation. Mrs. Jackson, who had heard of revolutions on the Continent, did not doubt for a moment but that one of these frightful things was taking place before her. She and her daughter hurried back with precipitation, haunted by all the terrors of the guillotine and the lamp-post. Louisa remembered a certain beautiful princess she had read of, who had been compelled to drink a cup of blood to save her father. What if they should treat her as they did the beautiful princess, and offer her such another cup, and force her to drink it, as the only means of saving her mother? Her heroism did not desert her. She resolved she would drink half. But as they were hurrying away full of these imaginary dangers, they rushed upon one of a more real though less imposing description. It is no joke in the narrow streets of Rome, to meet with a string of carts drawn by huge oxen, wallowing along under their uneasy yokes. Just such a string of carts encountered them as they turned one of the many narrow streets that conduct to the Pantheon. The enormous brutes went poking their spreading horns this way and that, in a manner very quiet perhaps in the animals apprehensions, but very alarming to those of Mrs. Jackson; huge horns, that were large enough, she thought, to spit an alderman, and still have, room for her at the top. The two ladies, seeing the first of these carts approach, had drawn-up close against the wall, and placed themselves on a little heap of rubbish to be more completely out of the way. To their dismay the line of these vehicles seemed to be endless—there was no escape—in that position they had to stand, while each brute as he passed turned his horns round to them, not with any ferocious intention, but as if he had a great curiosity to feel them, and examine their texture—an attention which would have been highly indecorous, to say the least of it.
What could Winston do, who encountered them in this predicament, but offer his escort? He calmed their various terrors—both of mad bulls and of revolutions—reconducted them to the Pantheon, and secured an exceedingly happy day for one at least of the party.
Winston had now been some time in Rome, and with an inconsistency so natural that it hardly merits the name of inconsistency, he found himself looking about in the galleries and churches for Mr. Bloomfield and his party, and with a curiosity which did not bespeak a very violent determination to avoid them. He began to think that they had lingered a long while at Florence. He had forgot the danger—he remembered the charm.