A MAN WITHOUT A HOPE!
You see, the case is in every way a hopeless one—for Tribulation Trepid never had a hope. He has no more idea of what you mean by a hope than a blind man can understand what you are talking about when you speak of colors. Hope!—how do you go about it—how do you begin when you want to hope? The first principle of hopefulness is not resident within the confines of the craniology of Tribulation Trepid; and, therefore, from the very moment of his birth, up and down—but more down than up—poor Tribulation Trepid has been lost in despond and in despair. Who ever called him “Young Hopeful?” It would have been the very heartlessness of cold derision.
If in the adventurousness of youth—for the earlier stages of existence form a perpetual exploring expedition, and an unceasing voyage of discovery into all sorts of holes and corners, to the constant annoyance of those who do not appreciate the march of mind in its primary manifestations—if then, at this interesting period, Tribulation Trepid undertook to exercise his limbs, and to gratify his curiosity by climbing up the chair, or ascending the table, that in this way his knowledge of the laws of gravitation might be increased, and his power of self-reliance extended, and if, thwartingly, at such perilous moment, as too often happens to be the case, the usual maternal caution fell upon his ear,
“Tribby, Tribby, what are you at? That child will fall and break its good-for-nothing neck!”
Tribby, of course, did fall—he was sure to do it—only suggest the worst of the alternatives to his mind, and, lacking hope to sustain his trembling limbs, he dropped at once into the fell catastrophe. He took it for granted that it must be so; and so it was. The great secret of successful adventure is confidence—a fixed faith in the potency of your star; and he who is deficient in this belief, will find it much better to remain at home, or to “go ashore,” than to tempt the chances of the storm. He, in truth, seeketh a shipwreck, who is not assured of his own buoyancy; and that man marches to an overthrow, whose mind is always dwelling on the probabilities of being beaten. He alone triumphs, who disdains to entertain a doubt of his own invincibility, and thus compels fortune to perch, whether she will or no, upon his daring banner. But such was not our Tribulation.
“Here, Tribby, take this pitcher down to Susan, and be sure you don’t fall, or I’ll box your ears, you Tribby.”
Under the doctrine of pains and penalties, which until lately formed the basis of all education—sound whipping and sound teaching having heretofore been identical—one would have thought that, with such a threatening over his head, Tribulation Trepid would not have dared to treat himself to a luxury so expensive as the species of tumble now referred to. To slip down stairs by himself is wicked enough in any child, when we reflect upon the uproar which every child is apt to create under these circumstances. But to slip down stairs, including a best pitcher in the gymnastic operation, to the exceeding detriment of the crockery, is an offence not to be excused at the judgment-seat of the good housekeeper. It is a sin which cannot be pardoned or overlooked.
“Now mind—don’t you fall and break that pitcher, Tribby, as you always do,” was the pursuing admonition to our child of wo, as he entered upon the labyrinthine convolutions of the dark stairway—but just then—did you not expect it?—cr-a-a-sh!—bimble—bumble—rub-dub!—Tribby has achieved his descent by a short hand process, and lies vociferously prone upon his back at the landing-place, environed by the fragments of the ware. We are not satisfied that it mended the matter at all, and we are quite sure it did not mend the pitcher; but we presume it was a satisfaction, if not to both, at least to one of the parties involved; and a satisfaction is something in this unsatisfactory state of existence; and so Tribulation Trepid received his promised reward—“I’ll teach you,” and so forth—causing his auricular appendages to reverberate for an hour or two, and likewise to be comfortably warm for at least the same space of time, affording him both his music and his caloric at the lowest possible rate; though it can scarcely be said that his hope underwent any considerable degree of augmentation by the process.
“Tribby Trepid doesn’t know his lesson, I am tolerably well assured of that,” said the teacher, glancing significantly at his rattan—for Tribulation Trepid underwent his share of schooling when rattan was lord paramount in the academic groves, and served, as it made the schoolboy “smart” in more senses than one, to counteract, on the part of preceptors, the baneful influences of sedentary life, by affording wholesome exercise in the “dusting of jackets.”