CHAPTER XLIII. 1. Men, with their heads, reflect on this and that; THE day after my arrival at the celebrated city of Bath, ther and always beautiful, I read an advertisement to the following effect, which, as retirement was my object, I lost no time in replying to; and it will be seen that I must have possessed no common share of vanity to assume to myself so many good qualities as those required by the advertisers: videlicet 66 Country Lodgings.A respectable gentleman under thirty, of good education, pleasing manners, unexceptionable moral character, and of social habits, may be accommodated with board and lodging in a small family in independent circumstances, residing in a comfortable house a few miles distant from this city, (Bath) whose object is solely to add to their society a person whose manners would be found agreeable and creditable to their acquaintance.-Address A. Z., at Mr. Crutwell's, Herald Office." It must be needless to observe that such an invitation did not remain unnoticed. A dozen of letters were received in reply, of which I was subsequently favoured with a perusal. I perceived that I did not stand alone in that pleasing delusion-a good opinion of oneself, the greater number of letters for the promised comfort being filled with descriptions of the peculiar excellency of temper, talents, and persons of the writers. As for myself, I wrote two lines referring to a branch of the worthy farmer Hailstone's family, residing at Bristol, for their opinion as to my claim to the character whose society the advertiser sought. I could not have presumed, with the slightest pretension to modesty, to say of myself any thing half so flattering as those good friends to whom I referred would say of me. I therefore went on the surest grounds, and was selected as the inmate, to the exclusion of all other candidates. In the course of three or four days every thing was arranged; and, furnished with my directions, I set forth about nine in a fine May morning for my place of destination, to which one of Pickwick's post chaises rattled me in less than half an hour. The servant girl who opened the outer gate on my descending from the carriage, cast a penetrating glance on my whole face and person, as if she were hereafter to become my jailer, and feared to lose one lineament of my countenance. The senior Abigail, who held the hall-door in hand-a good-looking but demure damsel of about thirty-was not a jot less curious or observant than the junior. Passing into the ball, I saw an object in advance in female garb, apparently waiting to receive me. This, thought I, must be Mrs. Alpha and Omega herself: so advancing, hat in hand, to make my bow of self-introduction, I was favoured by a reception at once formal and civil, but intended to be politely reserved. The lady ushered me into a spacious back parlour opening on a lawn. The beauties of the apartment redeemed the character of the house in my estimation, which at first appearance bore a strong resemblance to those select asylums where nervous ladies or gentlemen are kindly incarcerated by the humanity of their expectant relatives or friends, in order to be worried to death by an excessive care of their health, spirits, and persons. The rear of the mansion was really beautiful; but there was an old-maidish neatness and precision in the arrangements of this apartment which I could not associate with the agreeablelooking personage who stood before me-a brunette of about eight-and-twenty; a pair of brilliant black eyes, flashing fire in their momentary revolutions, almost depriving me of the power of analyzing the other features of her very striking countenance. The next point of attraction was her teeth; for the display of which, Nature, as if proud of the beautiful production, had left the casket "half open to view." With such eyes and such a mouth, it was almost a matter of indifference what kind of nosc intervened. So that there was a nose, the most fastidious in beauty ought to be satisfied. The upper and lower parts of the face would have atoned for any deformity short of the actual deficiency of the nasal promontory; but even this, when admiration could he spared and subdivided, must claim its full share. It fortunately escaped being long; but it was a goodly-sized feature, and would have given dignity to the countenance if the owner were not such an eternally restless, bustling kind of character, that every feature partook of her natural activity. Although I presented her a chair on our first entrance, and placed one for myself, I could not bring her to seat herself for one moment; nor would my politeness suffer me to repose while she bustled about the room, removing into the air a number of delicate plants which were arranged in this fragrant room. It was not yet ten o'clock, but the lady hostess seemed dressed for the day or the occasion. The junior maid-servant appeared to announce breakfast while I was lending my aid to the mistress in the arrangement of the flower-pots, when I took the liberty of offering the lady my hand, to lead her to the breakfast-room, according to etiquette; but she withdrew the hand which I had taken with respectful action, as if there were contagion in the touch of mine; and by one of her extraordinary looks, which expressed a chapter, she seemed to say, "What do you imagine the maid would think, to see me give my hand to a young man the first quarter of an hour we had ever seen each other?" Had she said this and more, the words could not have expressed her sentiments more powerfully than the comprehensive flash of her speaking eye. I followed in silence, bowing submissively to her "No, thank you, sir." Some ladies know themselves better than any one else; and if they are composed of combustible materials, they are right to avoid the application of the match to the train as long as-possible. The breakfast-table abounded in all that was good and proper for the occasion, but exhibited rather too great a display of plate. The sounds of a footstep, slowly and cautiously approaching, which appeared to be accompanied by the noise of a stick or crutch, prepared me for the entrance of a gouty, plethoric husband; but what was my surprise when on the opening of the door, I beheld hobbling into the room a personage, whom, at first sight, I might have mistaken for Time's eldest son! He marched, or rather halted, (if I may be allowed the military paradox,) into the room, apparently unobservant of all, until he arrived at his chair at the top of the table; when, previously to sitting down, he held his extended hand in front of his bald and wrinkled brow, to create a shade, and then cast ing his looks on me, inquired in a shrill and hollow tone of voice, "Patty, is this the captain?" "Yes, my dear," answered the lady in quite as high a key; and addressing me, said, "Mr. Sinnot, captain." The old man, kindly held forth his hand to me, who had of course risen on his entrance, and heartily shaking it, cried, "Sitee down, sitee down, thee bee'st welcome." I replied in good set terms of civil acknowledgment; which drew from Time jun. the following remark: "Naighbour Hailstone said as how thee bee'st Irish? why, thee speak'st English as well as we;" a compliment I could only reply to by a half-denying bow, and, obeying his injunctions, took my seat. I helped the lady to a slice of cherrycoloured gammon of Wiltshire bacon, worth its weight in dollars; to which she did ample justice. Had I been her lover, the performance of my hostess on the cold gammon might have gone far to assuage the warmth of my passion; but, as my countryman said, "I was but a lodger.' Our breakfast passed off with much good-humour on all sides, and I was requested to introduce a certain dark personage into the parlour, whom I take some shame to myself for having so long omitted to bring to my reader's recollection, although he had been in constant attendance on me during the last half-year; this was no other than the negro lad, Jean Baptiste, who had been so nearly immolated to the wrath of the superstitious Bateman. I took him on to London with me as valet, and had put him into livery. With all the vanity of his race, he had suffered his woolly fleece to grow to its extremest length, in order to tie it up into something like the semblance of a tail or queue: to effect which these poor creatures twist together several distinct locks, which from time to time they combine, and from the whole concoct a short and bushy tuft, which, from its comparative length, they imagine destroys their identity as the mere woolly-headed coast negro. Poor souls, what an ambition! Baptiste, who had lately thinned the whole of his front crop, and condensed seven tails into three of promising length, preparatory to their future junction, was called into the breakfast-parlour, in order to be exhibited to the lady and gentleman. After his skin, face, hands, and eyes, had undergone due scrutiny, and called forth those acute and sensible expressions of astonishment so peculiar to the British, such as, "Dear me!" "Indeed!" "You don't say so?" "Well, I'm sure?" &c.; his trio of tails became an object of mirthful attention with the lady and the junior maid-servant, and of deep inquiry to the senior, who was what is called serious, and whose starch face had been insinuated through the half-open parlour-door. " "What's the meaning of these?" inquired the lady, as she gently touched the frizzly tip of one, as if she feared it would sting her. 66 66 These, madam"-I answered, hesitatingly, "O! these are -but, I suppose you have read of bashaws of three tails?" "O! yes, sir, in 'Blue Beard!" quickly replied the lady. "Exactly, madam, exactly! Well, then, this Mr. Baptiste is, in his own country, a bashaw, and these are his tails of rank!" "Indeed!" said the lady, withdrawing her hand from the tuft with a look of infinite disappointment and incredulity. It was a ticklish subject, and I had no desire to push the explanation farther; but as Baptiste, who was a very good-looking and perfect negro, made his salaam, madam, who had scanned his person as a sculptor would study his model, pronounced him to be "a very nice man!" 1 The poor fellow was to leave me the next day, having pro cured him a place with a gentleman going back to the West Indies. As a servant he was quite an incumbrance to me; and, although he heartily disliked the country, and was constantly repining at his lot of-freedom, the thought of parting from a master who had been so indulgent to him, cost him many a tear. Breakfast over, the old gentleman, with frank independence of manner, opened on business; and drawing me near to him, as if I had been as dull of hearing as himself, cried out, "You must know that my dame and I sees very little company, and we find our time hang heavy at nights. (She does, I dare say, I thought, as I shook my head, and looked at the lady.) 'So,' says my dame, says she, 'suppose we have some quiet kind of a gentleman to live wi' us, and keep us alive, play a hand o cards, and tell us what's a going on in foreign parts, and all that.' Well, we gets the marquis's surveyor to draw up an advertisement, and we sends it to Bath, and so, now, you be come, you be heartily welcome; but mind-I goes to bed every night at ten o'clock, and we must all go to roost at the same time. I like quietness now, tho'f I were the devil of a rackety chap when a young one. Now you know our ways, I hope we'll agree." The old man having concluded his speech, the lady took up the unfinished expose. "It is true, captain, as my dear says, that we see little company except our near neighbours, but we take in the Bath and Reading newspapers, and subscribe to the circulating library; so that you will have quite books enough to amuse you.' "That is, madam, when I am so unfortunate as to be deprived of your conversation." "That's quite a compliment," observed the lady. "I am sure I read it in the 'Memoyers of a Welsh Heiress." 999 "It is the language of truth, madam, wherever you have met with it." What do you saie ?" asked the old man. "I am inviting the captain to take a walk after he sees his room, my dear." O excellent woman-we had been brutes without thee!" The arrangements of the sleeping-rooms were thus: the chamber of the gentleman and lady of the house was situated over the spacious back parlour; the front room on the same floor, called par excellence the "best, or chief drawing-room," looked out upon the fore-garden and road, besides having a commanding view of the beautiful vale of Avon, and its rich surrounding scenery. There were also smaller chambers on |