Boys and girls from Thackeray - Kate Dickinson Sweetser
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Dr. Portman was of the opinion that Pen should go to college. He thought
the time had come for the boy to leave his old surroundings, and, besides
study, have a moderate amount of the best society, too. Pen, who was
thoroughly out of harmony with his present surroundings, gloomily said he
would go, and in consequence of this decision not many weeks later the
widow and Laura nervously set about filling trunks with his books, and
linen, and making all necessary preparation for his departure, writing
cards with the name of Arthur Pendennis, Esquire, which were duly nailed
on the boxes; at which both the widow and Laura looked with tearful eyes.
A night soon came when the coach, with echoing horn and blazing lamps,
stopped at the lodge gate of Fair-Oaks, and Pen's trunks and his Uncle's
were placed on the roof of the carriage, into which the pair presently
afterwards entered. Mrs. Pendennis and Laura were standing by the
evergreens of the shrubbery, their figures lighted up by the coach lamps.
The guard cried "All right"; in another instant the carriage whirled
onward; the lights disappeared, and his mother's heart and prayers went
with them. Her sainted benedictions followed the departing boy. He had
left the home-nest in which he had been chafing; eager to go forth and
try his restless wings.
How lonely the house was without him! The corded trunks and book-boxes
were there in his empty study. Laura asked leave to come and sleep in
her aunt's room: and when she cried herself to sleep there, the mother
went softly into Pen's vacant chamber, and knelt down by the bed on
which the moon shone, and there prayed for her boy, as mothers only know
how to plead.
Pen passed a few days at the Major's lodgings in London, of which he
wrote a droll account to his dearest mother; and she and Laura read that
letter, and those which followed, many, many times, and brooded over
them, while Pen and the Major were arriving at Oxbridge; and Pen was
becoming acquainted with his surroundings. The boxes that his mother had
packed with so much care arrived in a few days. Pen was touched as he
read the cards in the dear well-known hand, and as he arranged in their
places all the books, and all the linen and table-cloths which Helen had
selected for him from the family stock, and all the hundred simple gifts
of home. Then came the Major's leave-taking, and truth to tell our friend
Pen was not sorry when he was left alone to enter upon his new career,
and we may be sure that the Major on his part was very glad to have done
his duty by Pen, and to have finished that irksome work. Having left Pen
in the company of Harry Foker, who would introduce him to the best set at
the University, the Major rushed off to London and again took up his
accustomed life.
We are not about to go through young Pen's academical career very
minutely. During the first term of his university life he attended
lectures with tolerable regularity, but soon discovering that he had
little taste for pursuing the exact sciences, he gave up his attendance
at that course and announced that he proposed to devote himself
exclusively to Greek and Roman Literature.
Mrs. Pendennis was for her part quite satisfied that her darling boy
should pursue that branch of learning for which he had the greatest
inclination; and only besought him not to ruin his health by too much
study, for she had heard the most melancholy stories of young students
who by overfatigue had brought on brain-fevers, and perished untimely in
the midst of their university career. Pen's health, which was always
delicate, was to be regarded, as she justly said, beyond all
considerations or vain honours. Pen, although not aware of any lurking
disease which was likely to endanger his life, yet kindly promised his
mamma not to sit up reading too late of nights, and stuck to his word in
this respect with a great deal more tenacity of resolution than he
exhibited upon some other occasions, when perhaps he was a little remiss.
Presently he began to find that he learned little good in the classical
lecture. His fellow-students there were too dull, as in mathematics they
were too learned for him. Pen grew weary of hearing the students and
tutor blunder through a few lines of a play which he could read in a
tenth part of the time which they gave to it. After all, private reading,
he decided, was the only study which was really profitable, and he
announced to his mamma that he should read by himself a great deal more
and in public a great deal less. That excellent woman knew no more about
Homer than she did about Algebra, but she was quite contented with Pen's
arrangements regarding his course of study, and felt perfectly confident
that her dear boy would get the place which he merited.
Pen did not come home until after Christmas, a little to the fond
mother's disappointment, and Laura's, who was longing for him to make a
fine snow fortification, such as he had made three winters before. But he
was invited to Logwood, Lady Agnes Foker's, where there were private
theatricals, and a gay Christmas party of very fine folks, some of whom
Major Pendennis would on no account have his nephew neglect. However, he
stayed at home for the last three weeks of the vacation, and Laura had
the opportunity of remarking what a quantity of fine new clothes he
brought with him, and his mother admired his improved appearance and
manly and decided tone.
He had not come home at Easter; but when he arrived for the long vacation
he brought more smart clothes; appearing in the morning in wonderful
shooting-jackets, with remarkable buttons; and in the evening in gorgeous
velvet waistcoats, with richly embroidered cravats, and curious linen.
And as she pried about his room, she saw, oh, such a beautiful
dressing-case, with silver mountings, and a quantity of lovely rings and
jewellery. And he had a new French watch and gold chain, in place of the
big old chronometer, with its bunch of jingling seals, which had hung
from the fob of John Pendennis. It was but a few months back Pen had
longed for this watch, which he thought the most splendid and august
time-piece in the world; and just before he went to college, Helen had
taken it out of her trinket box and given it to Pen with a solemn and
appropriate little speech respecting his father's virtues and the proper
use of time. This portly and valuable chronometer Pen now pronounced to
be out of date, and indeed made some comparisons between it and a
warming-pan, which Laura thought disrespectful; and he left it in a
drawer in the company of soiled primrose gloves and cravats which had
gone out of favour. His horse Pen pronounced no longer up to his weight,
and swapped her for another for which he had to pay rather a heavy
figure. Mrs. Pendennis gave the boy the money for the new horse, and
Laura cried when the old one was fetched away.
Arthur's allowances were liberal at this time, and thus he, the only son
of a country gentleman, and of a gentleman-like bearing and person, was
looked up to as a lad of much more consequence than he really was. His
manner was frank, brave and perhaps a little impertinent, as becomes a
high-spirited youth. He was generous and freehanded with his money, loved
joviality, and had a good voice for a song. He rode well to hounds,
appeared in pink as became a young buck, and managed to run up fine bills
in a number of quarters. In fact, he had almost every taste to a
considerable degree. He was very fond of books of all sorts and had a
very fair taste in matters of art; also a great partiality for fine
clothes and expensive jewellery.
In the course of his second year he had become one of the men of fashion
in the University, and a leader of the faithful band who hung around him
and wondered at him and loved him and imitated him. Now, it is easy to
calculate that with such tastes as Mr. Pen possessed he must in the
course of two or three years spend or owe a very handsome sum of money.
As he was not of a calculating turn he certainly found himself frequently
in debt, but this did not affect his gaiety of spirit. He got a
prodigious in the University and was hailed as a sort of Crichton: and as
for the English verse prize, although Jones carried it that year, the
undergraduates thought Pen's a much finer poem, and he had his verses
printed at his own expense, and distributed in gilt morocco covers
amongst his acquaintance.
Amidst his friends, and a host of them there were, Pen passed more than
two brilliant and happy years. He had his fill of pleasure and
popularity. No dinner or supper party was complete without him. He became
the favourite and leader of young men who were his superiors in wealth
and station, but also did not neglect the humblest man of his
acquaintance in order to curry favour with the richest young grandee in
the University. He became famous and popular: not that he did much, but
there was a general idea that he could do a great deal if he chose. "Ah,
if Pendennis would only _try_" the men said, "he might do anything." One
by one the University honours were lost by him, until he ceased to
compete. But he got a declamation prize and brought home to his mother
and Laura a set of prize books begilt with the college arms, and so
magnificent that the ladies thought that Pen had won the largest honour
which Oxbridge was capable of awarding.
Vacation after vacation passed without the desired news that Pen had sat
for any scholarship or won any honour, and Pen grew rebellious and
unhappy, and there was a tacit feud between Dr. Portman, who was
disappointed in Arthur, and the lad himself. Mrs. Pendennis, hearing Dr.
Portman prophesy that Pen would come to ruin, trembled in her heart, and
little Laura also--Laura who had grown to be a fine young stripling,
graceful and fair, clinging to her adopted mother and worshipping her
with a passionate affection. Both of these women felt that their boy was
changed. He was no longer the artless Pen of old days, so brave, so
impetuous, so tender. He spent little of his vacations at home, but went
on visits, and scared the quiet pair at Fair-Oaks by stories of great
houses to which he had been invited, and by talking of lords without
their titles.
But even with all his weaknesses there was a kindness and frankness about
Arthur Pendennis which won most people who came in contact with him, and
made it impossible to resist his good-nature, or in his worst moments not
to hope for his rescue from utter ruin. At the time of his career of
university pleasure he would leave the gayest party to sit with a sick
friend and was only too ready to share any money which he had with a
poorer one.
In his third year at college the duns began to gather awfully round about
him, and descended upon him in such a number that the tutors were
scandalised, and even brave-hearted Pen was scared. Hearing of his
nephew's extravagances, Major Pendennis interviewed that young man, and
was thunderstruck at the extent of his liabilities after receiving Pen's
dismal confession of the trouble in which he was involved.
Perhaps it was because she was so tender and good that Pen was terrified
lest his mother should know of his sins. "I can't bear to break it to
her," he said to the tutor, in an agony of grief. "Oh! sir, I've been a
villain to her!"
--and he repented, and asked himself, Why, why, did his uncle insist
upon the necessity of living with great people, and in how much did all
his grand acquaintance profit him?
They were not shy of him, but Pen thought they were, and slunk from them
during his last terms at college. He was as gloomy as a death's-head at
parties, which he avoided of his own part, or to which his young friends
soon ceased to invite him. Everybody knew that Pendennis was "hard up."
At last came the Degree Examinations. Many a young man of his year, whose
hob-nailed shoes Pen had derided, and whose face or coat he had
caricatured, many a man whom he had treated with scorn in the
lecture-room or crushed with his eloquence in the debating club, many of
his own set who had not half his brains, but a little regularity and
constancy of occupation, took high places in the honours or passed within
decent credit. And where in the list was Pen, the superb; Pen, the wit
and dandy; Pen, the poet and orator? Ah, where was Pen, the widow's
darling and sole pride? Let us hide our heads and shut up the page. The
lists came out; and a dreadful rumour rushed through the University, that
Pendennis of Boniface was plucked.
During the latter part of Pen's university career the Major had become
very proud of Arthur on account of his high spirits, frank manners, and
high, gentleman-like bearing. He made more than one visit to Oxbridge and
had an almost paternal fondness for Pen, whom he bragged about at his
clubs, and introduced with pleasure into his conversation. He boasted
everywhere of the boy's great talents and of the brilliant degree he was
going to take as he wrote over and over again to Pen's mother, who for
her part was ready to believe anything that anybody chose to say in
favour of her son.
And all this pride and affection of uncle and mother had been trampled
down by Pen's wicked extravagance and idleness. I don't envy Pen's
feelings as he thought of what he had done. He had marred at its outset
what might have been a brilliant career. He had dipped ungenerously into
a generous mother's purse, and basely and recklessly spent her little
income. Poor Arthur Pendennis felt perfectly convinced that all England
would remark the absence of his name from the examination lists and talk
about his misfortune. His wounded tutor, his many duns, the
undergraduates--how could he bear to look any of them in the face now?
After receiving the news of his disgrace he rushed to his rooms and there
penned a letter to his tutor full of thanks, regards, remorse and
despair, requesting that his name might be taken off the college books,
and intimating a wish that death might speedily end the woes of the
disgraced Arthur Pendennis. Then he slunk out, scarcely knowing where he
went, taking the unfrequented little lanes at the backs of the college
buildings until he found himself some miles distant from Oxbridge. As he
went up a hill, a drizzling January rain beating in his face and his
ragged gown flying behind him, for he had not taken it off since the
morning, a post-chaise came rattling up the road with a young gentleman
in it who caught sight of poor Pen's pale face, jumped out of the
carriage and ran towards him, exclaiming, "I say,--Hello, old boy, where
are you going, and what's the row now?"
"I am going where I deserve to go," said Pen.
"This ain't the way," said his friend Spavin, smiling. "I say, Pen, don't
take on because you are plucked. It is nothing when you are used to it.
I've been plucked three times, old boy, and after the first time I
didn't care. You'll have better luck next time."
Pen looked at his early acquaintance who had been plucked, who had been
rusticated, who had only after repeated failures learned to read and
write correctly, but who, in spite of all these drawbacks had attained
the honour of a degree.
"This man has passed," he thought, "and I have failed." It was almost too
much for him to bear.
"Good-bye," said he; "I am very glad you are through. Don't let me keep
you. I am in a hurry--I am going to town to-night."
"Gammon!" said his friend, "this ain't the way to town; this is the
Fenbury road, I tell you."
"I was just going to turn back," Pen said.
"All the coaches are full with the men going down," Spavin said. Pen
winced. "You'd not get a place for a ten-pound note. Get in here. I'll
drop you where you have a chance of the Fenbury mail. I'll lend you a hat
and coat; I've got lots. Come along; jump in, old boy--go it, leathers!"
And in this way Pen found himself in Mr. Spavin's post-chaise and rode
with that gentleman as far as the Ram Inn at Mudford, fifteen miles from
Oxbridge, where the Fenbury mail changed horses, and where Pen got a
place on to London.
The next day there was an immense excitement at Oxbridge, where, for some
time, a rumour prevailed, to the terror of Pen's tutor and tradesmen,
that Pendennis, maddened at losing his degree, had made away with
himself. A battered cap, in which his name was almost discernible,
together with a seal bearing his crest of an eagle looking at a now
extinct sun, had been found three miles on the Fenbury road, near a mill
stream; and for four-and-twenty hours it was supposed that poor Pen had
flung himself into the stream, until letters arrived from him, bearing
the London post-mark.
The coach reached London at the dreary hour of five; and he hastened to
the inn at Covent Garden, where the ever-wakeful porter admitted him, and
showed him to a bed. Pen looked hard at the man, and wondered whether
Boots knew he was plucked? When in bed he could not sleep there. He
tossed about restlessly until the appearance of daylight, when he sprang
up desperately, and walked off to his uncle's lodgings in Bury Street.
"Good 'evens! Mr. Arthur, what 'as 'appened, sir?" asked the valet, who
was just carrying in his wig to the Major.
"I want to see my uncle," Pen cried in a ghastly voice, and flung himself
down on a chair.
The valet backed before the pale and desperate-looking young man,
with terrified and wondering glances, and disappeared into his
master's apartment, whence the Major put out his head as soon as he
had his wig on.
"What? Examination over? Senior Wrangler, Double First Class, hey?" said
the old gentleman. "I'll come directly," and the head disappeared.
Pen was standing with his back to the window, so that his uncle could not
see the expression of gloomy despair on the young man's face. But when he
held out his hand to Pen, and was about to address him in his cheery,
high-toned voice, he caught sight of the boy's face; and dropping his
hand said, "Why, Pen, what's the matter?"
"You'll see it in the papers at breakfast, sir," Pen said.
"See what?"
"My name isn't there, sir."
"Hang it, why _should_ it be?" asked the Major, more perplexed.
"I have lost everything, sir," groaned out Pen; "my honour's gone; I'm
ruined irretrievably; I can't go back to Oxbridge."
"Lost your honour?" screamed out the Major. "Heaven alive! You don't mean
to say you have shown the white feather?"
Pen laughed bitterly at the word feather, and repeated it. "No, it isn't
that, sir. I'm not afraid of being shot; I wish anybody would shoot me. I
have not got my degree. I--I'm plucked, sir."
The Major had heard of plucking, but in a very vague and cursory way, and
concluded that it was some ceremony performed corporally upon rebellious
university youth. "I wonder you can look me in the face after such a
disgrace, sir," he said; "I wonder you submitted to it as a gentleman."
"I couldn't help it, sir. I did my classical papers well enough: it was
those infernal mathematics, which I have always neglected."
"Was it--was it done in public, sir?" the Major said.
"What?"
"The--the plucking?" asked the guardian, looking Pen anxiously in the
face.
Pen perceived the error under which his guardian was labouring, and in
the midst of his misery the blunder caused the poor wretch a faint smile,
and served to bring down the conversation from the tragedy-key in which
Pen had been disposed to carry it on. He explained to his uncle that he
had gone in to pass his examination, and failed. On which the Major said,
that though he had expected far better things of his nephew, there was no
great misfortune in this, and no dishonour as far as he saw, and that
Pen must try again.
"Me again at Oxbridge!" Pen thought, "after such a humiliation as
that?" He felt that, except he went down to burn the place, he could
not enter it.
But it was when he came to tell his uncle of his debts that the other
felt surprise and anger most keenly, and broke out into speeches most
severe upon Pen, which the lad bore, as best he might, without flinching.
It appeared that his bills in all amounted to about L700; and furthermore
it was calculated that he had had more than twice that sum during his
stay at Oxbridge. This sum he had spent, and for it he had to show--what?
"You need not press a man who is down, sir," Pen said to his uncle,
gloomily. "I know very well how wicked and idle I have been. My mother
won't like to see me dishonoured, sir," he continued, with his voice
failing; "and I know she will pay these accounts. But I shall ask her for
no more money."
"As you like, sir," the Major said. "You are of age, and my hands are
washed of your affairs. But you can't live without money, and have no
means of making it that I see, though you have a fine talent in spending
it, and it is my belief that you will proceed as you have begun, and ruin
your mother before you are five years older. Good-morning; it is time for
me to go to breakfast. My engagements won't permit me to see you much
during the time that you stay in London. I presume that you will acquaint
your mother with the news which you have just conveyed to me."
And pulling on his hat, and trembling in his limbs somewhat, Major
Pendennis walked out of his lodgings before his nephew, and went ruefully
off to take his accustomed corner at the club, where he saw the Oxbridge
examination lists in the morning papers, and read over the names with
mournful accuracy, thinking also with bitterness of the many plans he had
formed to make a man of his nephew, of the sacrifices which he had made,
and of the manner in which he was disappointed. And he wrote a letter to
Dr. Portman telling him what had happened and begging the Doctor to break
the sad news to Helen. Then the Major went out to dinner, one of the
saddest men in any London dining-room that day.
On receipt of the Major's letter Dr. Portman went at once to Fair-Oaks to
break the disagreeable news to Mrs. Pendennis. She had already received a
letter from Pen, and to the Doctor's great indignation she seemed to feel
no particular unhappiness except that her darling boy should be unhappy.
What was this degree that they made such an outcry about, and what good
would it do Pen? Why did Dr. Portman and his uncle insist upon sending
the boy where there was so much temptation to be risked, and so little
good to be won? Why didn't they leave him at home with his mother? Her
boy was coming back to her repentant and tender-hearted,--why should she
want more? As for his debts, of course they must be paid;--his
debts.--Wasn't his father's money all his, and hadn't he a right to spend
it? In this way the widow met the virtuous Doctor, and all his anger took
no effect upon her gentle bosom.
As for Laura, Pen's little adopted sister, she was no longer the simple
girl of Pen's college days, but a tall, slim, handsome young lady. At the
age of sixteen she was a sweet young lady indeed, ordinarily pale, with a
faint rose-tinge in her cheeks. Her eyes were very large and some critics
said that she was in the habit of making play with those eyes, but the
fact is that nature had made them so to shine and to look, that they
could no more help so looking and shining than one star can help being
brighter than another. It was doubtless to soften their brightness that
Miss Laura's eyes were provided with two veils in the shape of the
longest and finest black eyelashes. Her complexion was brilliant, her
smile charming, while her voice was so low and sweet that to hear it was
like listening to sweet music.
Now, this same charming Miss Laura had only been half pleased with Pen's
general conduct and bearing during the past two years. His letters to his
mother had been very rare and short. It was in vain that the fond widow
urged how constant Arthur's occupations and studies were, and how many
his engagements. "It is better that he should lose a prize," Laura said,
"than forget his mother: and indeed, Mamma, I don't see that he gets many
prizes. Why doesn't he come home and stay with you, instead of passing
his vacations at his great friends' fine houses? There is nobody there
that will love him half as much as you do." Thus Laura declared stoutly,
nor would she be convinced by any of Helen's fond arguments that the boy
must make his way in the world; that his uncle was most desirous that Pen
should cultivate the acquaintance of persons who were likely to befriend
him in life; that men had a thousand ties and calls which women could not
understand, and so forth.
But as soon as Miss Laura heard that Pen was unfortunate and unhappy, all
her anger straightway vanished, giving place to the most tender
compassion. He was the Pen of old days, the frank and affectionate, the
generous and tender-hearted. She at once took side with Helen against Dr.
Portman when he cried out at the enormity of Pen's transgressions.
Debts? What were his debts? They were a trifle; he had been thrown into
expensive society by his uncle's order, and of course was obliged to live
in the same manner as the young gentlemen whose company he frequented.
Disgraced by not getting his degree? The poor boy was ill when he went
for the examinations; he couldn't think of his mathematics and stuff on
account of those very debts which oppressed him; very likely some of the
odious tutors and masters were jealous of him, and had favourites of
their own whom they wanted to put over his head. Other people disliked
him and were cruel to him, and were unfair to him, she was very sure.