PROPHETS IN THE PARLOUR—GYPSIES IN THE KITCHEN.
When Susan, maid-of-all-work in the regular and respectable family of Mr. Potts—small Cityman, with ambition under his waistcoat to be some day considerably bigger—when the aforesaid illiterate and superstitious Susan, wishing to better herself—(a vanity that is unconsciously shared with her even by Mr. and Mrs. Potts themselves)—gives ready ear to Eglantine Prigduck, gypsey from Barnes or Norwood—Eglantine dealing in husbands of every variety and at the shortest notice—and, giving ear to the prophetic gypsey, gives her at the same time an opportunity to draw into her Maelstrom pocket or wallet certain silver spoons, afterwards identified by Mr. Potts—his own initials lovingly intertwining with the initials of Mrs. Potts, with the family crest of a rampant lion licking his tongue at posterity indubitably marking them as his property—
When, we say, Susan weeps and knocks her knees together, in a paroxysm of terror before the worthy and respected Mr. Sixmunce—and the indomitable Eglantine looks callously innocent, calling all the stars to witness that "the gal giv her the spoons as her own goods and nobody's else's—"
When Susan is confronted with this alleged fact—the respectable part of society of which Mr. and Mrs. Potts are such very distinguished members, shakes its head, and wonders how ignorance at eight pounds a year, tea and sugar included, can be such a fool as to believe in a gypsey! However, the benevolent Mr. Sixmunce commits Eglantine to Tothill-Fields, and—with one of those paternal remonstrances that have won for him the proud designation of the Father of the Bench—dismisses the grateful Susan to her kitchen, Mr. and Mrs. Potts, with a sudden benevolence, which causes them some after astonishment and self-congratulation on their goodness, consenting to give the creature another trial.
Now at the very time that Susan was opening her homely hand, that gypsey Eglantine might read in its hard page the marriage lines of the hopeful maiden (who is to give sixpence at most for the glad tidings; the spoons being purely an after-thought of the gypsey's own)—at the very time Mrs. Potts in her parlour is reading Raphael's Prophetic Messenger; for the which she—the educated, finished Mrs. Potts; for was she not beautifully finished at Athens House, Wandsworth?—for the which she has, in the best faith and best current silver, disbursed two-and-sixpence! Ignorance crieth out in the streets, and everybody gives ear to her. Our Messenger has, to be sure, a more winning introduction than even the smiles and musical cajolery of Eglantine Prigduck. For it has a beautiful picture in which the events of 1854 are brought out in bold red, and blue, and orange-tawney. Louis Naploleon is engaged chatting with Britannia—(who is asking him to run across and take a cup of tea in London, the British Lion at her side manifesting no objection whatever)—the while a very hairy savage has a dagger upraised at the Emperor's back, and is evidently screwing himself up to "the sticking place." There are mourning-coaches going to "take up" at Windsor Castle, with other graphic amenities significant of what must happen in the year 1854. And for this the enlightened Mrs. Potts (that gypsey is still with Susan in the kitchen) has given two-and-sixpence; and that too with the mighty resolution of getting her good half-crown's worth out of it. Well, Mrs. Potts begins with January, turning very pale as she learns this fact:—
"The square of Venus and Saturn denotes severe affliction to a lady of the highest rank. The tranquillity of France is disturbed; much excitement reigns in Paris, Lyons, Toulouse, and Rome. Turkey and the regions of the Tigris and Euphrates are sorely afflicted."
This lady—whoever she may be—has very sore afflictions throughout twelvemonth; but then Raphael must earn his half-crown's worth.