The fact was the doctor was short of cash, and that through more than one unfortunate speculation in which he had embarked. Like a great many more men of moderate income, he had been bitten with the desire to increase it, though the bite came in the first instance from his wife, who scolded him fiercely when, after the MD honour had been thrust upon him, he gave up the union practice, which entailed the loss of the regular salary of one hundred pounds per annum. The doctor said that it was not becoming for a physician to be the medical attendant of the parish; and Mrs Hardon, who was then in a worldly, everyday phase, declared that it was “all fiddlesticks’ ends,” when there was his cheque regularly at certain times, while the greater part of the work could be done by the assistant, who would do very well for the poor people. It was a sin and a shame, she declared, though how connected with fiddlesticks’ ends was best known to herself. There was, however, something relating to the musical science in the matter, for Mrs Doctor Hardon kept harping upon the same string until the doctor snapped it by furiously threatening her if another word was said about it – threats which Mrs Hardon noticed so much that she certainly held her tongue; and she held her hand too, and tried to annoy the doctor by keeping a bad table, which she said so great a loss every year necessitated. Poor woman! she little knew that the time would come when such economy would be forced upon her. What, she asked the doctor, was honour without money? What was the use of her being a physician’s wife if they had nothing to support it with? And, then, too for him to be such an ass – the doctor started and puffed out his cheeks at this – “Yes, ass,” said Mrs Hardon, “as to play into your adversary’s hand like that, when he was on the verge of ruin, as everybody said, and could not have kept on another six months; for you to throw the union practice and a hundred a-year into his lap, and supply him with the material for carrying on the war!”
Mrs Doctor Hardon spoke of the rival practitioner, a poor, gentlemanly man, who had set up some years before in the dusty town of Somesham, and had been fighting ever since with difficulties; for, as in all small country towns in this land of liberty, every new-comer was looked upon as an intruder – a foreigner – and one who will probably interfere with the fine old conservative notions of the place. They don’t want him, and they won’t have him if they can help it. He is clever, perhaps; but they don’t want clever people, and they would prefer being half-killed by the old practitioner to being cured by the new. Trade or profession, it is just the same; and perhaps the acts of the town are only the acts of the country in miniature. Hospitality we have in plenty, and our share of the virtues, no doubt; but truly we English have most strongly in us the propensity for turning our backs upon those who are trying to fight their way on, until they can manage to do without help, when we turn round, smiling with the features that frowned before, pat the successful man upon the back, and say, “Well done!”
Mr Brande, “the new man,” as he was called, had found all this, and had been ready to despair again and again through the many years he had been trying to make a practice; but now the turning-point had come in the honours of Thomas Hardon, Esq, MD; not that he had reaped much present advantage, and it was doubtful if he would have had the practice at all if Doctor Hardon had not had immediate want for a hundred and fifty pounds, and, trusting to Mr Brande’s honour as a gentleman, offered to throw up the parish work on condition of receiving that sum, which Mr Brande gave him in bills, and, what was more, screwed, economised, and met them as they fell due. But Mrs Doctor Hardon did not know this, nor yet the extent of the liabilities her lord had incurred; while the deeper he sunk in that black, clinging mire of debt, the more reticent he grew.
Volume One – Chapter Eight.
Mr Pawley’s Performance
“Such a beautiful, well-cut letter too!” said old Matt Space, as he stood looking at the empty type-rack from whence the cases had been taken to furnish money for Septimus Hardon’s present expenses. “In such good order too. Puts me in mind of being so low down that I had to sell my own stick. Fellow always seems so badly off when he gets selling his tools.”
A tap at the door, following the sound of wheels, interrupted the old man’s soliloquy, and going to the door he admitted the undertaker, who had just arrived with his shabby Shillibeer hearse and mourning-coach in one, with which he performed the economic funerals so frequent in his district.
“Here you are, then,” said old Matt, grimly surveying the new-comer.
“Yes, here we are,” said the undertaker, in a subdued, melancholy tone; and then he drew out a pocket-handkerchief and wiped his eye, as if to remove a tear – in fact, he did remove a tear – though not sorrow-shed, for Mr Pawley was in very good spirits just then; but he had an eye afflicted with a watery weakness which necessitated the constant application of a handkerchief, and this had passed with a certain class of people for the manifestation of sorrow for their griefs. Some said that this eye had been a little fortune to him. Perhaps it had, but doubtless the crowded courts clustering round Lincoln’s-inn had done more to keep up the incessant “rat-tat-tat-tat” heard in his shop, a sound as if grim Death were tapping with those bony fingers of his at the door.
“Such a feeling man!” said Mrs Sims, who was always at home upon such occasions as this, and had now come to mind Septimus Hardon’s boy, and help; “if she could be of service leastways, for it’s few berrins take place about here, mom, that they don’t send for me,” she said with a sniff, and the corner of her apron to her eye.
“Here you are, then,” said old Matt to the undertaker.
“Yes, here we are,” said Mr Pawley; “but you ain’t a-going, are you?”
“Well, who said I was?” said Matt gruffly. “You’re a-going, ain’t you? and that’s enough for you.”
Mr Pawley took so much pride in his funerals being properly performed, that going himself did not seem enough for him, and he continued to gaze doubtfully over a very uncomfortable white cravat, one of which the bow was supposed to be tied behind, giving him a good deal the aspect of a man who had been decapitated, and then had his head secured in its place by a bandage.
But old Matt did not give the undertaker an opportunity for a long inspection of his shabby black clothes, for having announced the grim functionary, that gentleman went up the creaking stairs upon the points of his toes to proceed with the duties he had in hand; while, as old Matt stood in the passage watching his long black body it seemed to him that the stairs cracked and creaked mournfully, as if resenting the feet laid upon them, in anticipation of a heavier descent.
But there was to be no heavy load for them to bear this time, for it was but a little coffin – a little white coffin that had been gazed into for the last time, where the gentle waxen features seemed to wear a smile, so sad, speaking such a tender farewell in its sweetness, that Lucy Grey sobbed aloud with the parents, until Mrs Sims entered the room, whispered to Septimus, and then they all slowly passed out to give place to Mr Pawley. And then standing in the next room, Mrs Septimus, weak and ailing, almost fainted as she heard the harsh noise of the driver as it slipped first in one and then another of the screws.
But now the last screw had been tightened, the light burden placed in the receptacle, and Mrs Sims, quite a regular aid to Mr Goffer, arranged the scarf upon Septimus Hardon’s hat; pinned and tied the hoods and cloaks upon mother and daughter; and then, in a simple but feeling way, wept many a salt tear into her black-alpaca apron, sniffing terribly the while Mr Pawley, satisfied in his mind that the respectability of his performance was not to be damaged by so doubtful a character as the old compositor, stood holding open the door of the carriage with one hand, wiping his eye with the other, and awaiting the mourners’ descent.
For this was no grand funeral; there had been no mutes standing with draped staves at the door; there was no squadron of men with scarves and brass-tipped truncheons; no tray of black plumes to be carried in advance; no high-stepping, long-tailed black horses, with velvet housings and tossing heads; nothing to make a funeral imposing and attractive. But there were spectators even for this: inhabitants of Carey-street were stealthily watching from door-steps, or from the corners of windows, as if afraid of intruding upon the mourners’ sorrow; a knot of dirty children from Bennett’s-rents had collected, many of whom toiled beneath shawl-wrapped burdens of heavy babies almost equal to themselves in bulk; two women stood upon the opposite side with arms wrapped in their aprons; a ticket-porter, in apron and badge, leaned against the nearest lamp-post; the apple-woman at the corner did something unusual, she left her basket, knocked the ashes out of her short black pipe, and then rubbed a tear – a bright, gem-like tear – off her poor old cheek, withered as one of her own pippins, before placing her pipe in her pocket, and leaning with arms akimbo against the railings to see the hearse pass with a little customer of hers, for whom she had always picked out the best lot, and in her simple homely way called down heavenly favour with a hearty “God bless you!” An old law-writer, a man who reckoned life as a long brief in so many folios, old and snuffy, and shabby almost as Matt himself, walked by house and hearse to the office where he worked, pretending to whistle; but no sound came, and he blew his nose in a way that raised an echo in the silent street as soon as he was a few yards past the place; even the policeman, beating his Berlin gloves together, quietly sent off the children gathered in the way, and posted them at a distance, that they might not annoy the sad party so soon to leave the house.
And now a tall dark woman, carrying a child, appeared upon the scene, and stood with dimmed eye watching till the mourners descended, when, catching sight of Septimus Hardon’s bent form, she stepped forward eagerly, but only to shrink back shivering as she clutched her babe to her breast, pressing her lips upon its plump cheek, while an air of wonderment came into the woman’s face as the announcement above the door now caught her eye: – “S Hardon, Legal and General Printer.”
For there was sorrow in Carey-street that day – sorrow of a novel kind. All the neighbourhood knew why the blinds were down at Hardon’s; for all knew the tall graceful girl who led about the two golden-haired children that seemed so out of place in the legal region; all knew that one of these little ones had passed away – that the little flower, sweet and fragrant, so lately blooming in the cold harsh place, and raising its heaven-whispering head amongst them, had been cut down by the cold winds that swept the weary waste. “Our client” had stopped at this oasis in the desert he was crossing, for he had often paused to look up at the golden head at the upper window, gazed at it awhile, and then passed on, refreshed and gladdened in heart. Every dweller in the neighbourhood had had a kind word or look for Lucy’s charges; and there was a sun in those golden tresses, a warm light, that would often melt the icy frost of some old lawyer’s countenance, and bring there a smile of pleasure. But a month before, two men were passing Carey-street with Punch, bound westward to the district where there is less constraint and mind-engrossing; and the man who bore the show, following the usage which to him was second nature, looked up at the dirty windows with wandering eye, caught sight of the blue-eyed fairy, looked at her with doubt for an instant, and then pitched his theatre, to the astonishment of his drum-and-pan-pipe “pardner,” who would as soon have thought of playing in the cloisters of Westminster Abbey.
“Jest five minutes,” whispered his mate, pointing upwards; when, as if by magic, the pipes squeaked, the drum rolled, raising up the wondering ghosts of echoes from amidst the pouncy dust of ages, while the yellowy, torn green baize fell, to conceal the motive power of the puppets; and then for “jest five minutes” “our client” was startled, the parchments in the offices crackled, dust floated from ledges out upon the murky air, and the sanctity of the place was broken by the ribald jokes of our old friend. Then, just as an astonished troop of children came with a rush out of Bennett’s-rents, up went the green curtain; there came a friendly nod from one of the men, who placed himself Atlas-like beneath his drum, a broad grin from the other at the child’s delight, and then off due west.
And now the change had come; the cold blast that sweeps down Carey-street had been colder and keener; the fragile flower-stalk was broken; the white coffin was in its place, the mourners in the coach; the door banged gently, for the wood had warped. Mr Pawley had climbed beside his red-nosed driver, and sat wiping his eye; while the poor old broken-kneed black horse ambled and shambled off with its head down, as if ashamed of the false tail that it knew was fastened to the crupper of its harness.
Then the rest, – the sad rite, the solemn words, the swelling hearts aching to leave so sweet a form in so cold and damp a bed, loth to believe that what they had loved could turn to corruption, and then to the dust of the earth. Then back to the shabby carriage, whose driver had refreshed himself with gin, which attacked his nose; while the horse yet twisted an obstinate wisp of hay that hung sideways in his bit, and would not be ground into nutriment. Once more the banging of the door, and Mr Pawley up beside the driver, with his grief still unassuaged; while as the poor beast that drew the carriage shambled back, his load was so little lightened that he knew not the difference.
The house in Carey-street had looked sad and gloomy for days past, for even the lodgers had drawn down their blinds, and ascended the stairs carefully and even stealthily, speaking, too, in whispers; but now the light was freely admitted, and Mrs Sims had blown up a good fire, only stopping to sniff, and drop a tear or two upon the bellows now and then, the last being a domestic implement that she had run home to the Square and fetched for the occasion. The tea was prepared, and she had made what she called the most of the place, – not that that was much, – ready for the mourners’ return; while old Matt was ruining the knees of his trousers by making himself a horse, and crawling up and down the dirty printing-office floor with the little boy upon his back. The rooms looked almost cheerful now, for, save in the returned mourners’ hearts, all was over, and the solemn scene, the dark, damp grave, the catching of the breath as the first earth fell, the long last look at the white coffin – all things of the past.
Old Matthew Space was a wise man in his way; and as soon as he thought that there had been time for the changing of habiliments, – that is to say, about a quarter of an hour after Mr Pawley had presented his account, been paid, and taken his departure, offering old Matt sixpence, which he indignantly refused to take, – he put on a bright face, and took the little fellow in his charge upstairs, crowing and chattering with delight at riding upon the old man’s shoulders.
“No, thankee, sir,” said the old man, in answer to Septimus Hardon’s invitation to stay to tea; and as he declined he glanced down at his clothes.
“I did not ask the clothes,” said Septimus warmly, “but the man who has shown sympathy in this weary time of trouble; and God knows I did not expect to find friends where I have,” muttered the dejected man, who looked ten years older; while at times his eyes wandered in a weary abstracted way about the room, and his hands were wrung together, till Lucy came to his side and spoke to him, when the lost, helpless look would pass off, and he would brighten up for a few minutes.
“Such a beautiful, well-cut letter, though!” muttered old Matt as he took the chair placed for him by Mrs Sims, when the little fellow forced himself off his mother’s lap, and climbed upon the old man’s knee.
“You must hold up, mum,” whispered Mrs Sims to poor, broken-down, invalid Mrs Septimus. “I know what it all is; for when I lived in the Rents, mum, I lost four; and all within three year.”
“You did!” said Mrs Septimus, laying a tender hand upon the poor woman’s arm.
“O yes!” said Mrs Sims. “It was before I went to mind the house in the Square, and used to wash; but it was sich work, mum! nowhere to dry except a bit of leads, and the strings tied across the room, and the blacks allus a-coming down like a shower, while every drop o’ water had to be fetched from right at the bottom of the house. One was obliged to do it, though, for times were very hard just then; but having so much washing ain’t good and healthy for children, let alone being stived up so closte. You see, ’m, it’s a bad place to live in, them Rents, there’s too many in a house, and there’s so much wants doing; but then, when you’re a bit behind with your rent, you can’t grumble, or there’s your few bits of sticks taken, and plenty more glad to have your room. But the way the poor little children is snatched off there, mum, ’s terrible, though I do sometimes say, as it’s a happy release. Mr Pawley, mum, he ’ave told me that them Rents is as good as an annuity to him; for you see, though it isn’t a big place, there’s a many families in each house; and where there’s families, mum, there’s mostly children.”
Mrs Septimus sighed bitterly at the last word, while, poor woman, she was too much intent upon her cares to notice the wisdom of the speech.
“But you hold up now, mum, there’s a good creetur. I know it’s very hard, but then we all has to suffer alike, and you’ve got to recklect what you owes to that poor dear child there, and young miss, and the master.”
As for Septimus Hardon, he was talking in an abstracted way to old Matt, who was discussing business matters, and urging energetic measures in the office; but talking to Septimus Hardon was a difficult matter, and put you much in mind of catching a grazing horse: you held a bait before him, and then gradually edged him up into a corner, when, just as you thought you had him, he was off and away full gallop to another part of the mental field; and so the work had to be done all over again. Old Matt found it so, and after several times over waking to the fact that while he was talking upon one subject Septimus Hardon was thinking upon another, he rose and took his departure.
Volume One – Chapter Nine.
Old Matt on Manners
Old Matt Space came daily to Carey-street in search of a job, and generally made an excuse for seeing little Tom, for whom he had a cake, a biscuit, or some small penny toy, purchased of one of the peripatetic vendors in the street.
“I always like to support honest industry,” said the old man; and when in work, and with a few shillings in his pocket, he would take a walk along the busy streets, and perhaps spend a couple of his shillings with the people whose place of business is the edge of the pavement. “Well, suppose I am a fool for doing it, what then?” said Matt one day. “Ain’t ninety per cent of the inhabitants of this precious country of ours what you call fools; and if I, in my folly, help twenty or thirty poor folks up a step in getting their bit of a living, where’s the harm? Don’t tell me,” old Matt would say to his fellow-workmen, beginning to unload the pockets which made his coat-tails stick out almost at right angles; “I don’t buy the things because I want them, I do it to help them as wants it; and their name, as it says in the Testament, is ‘legion.’ Now, that’s a jumping frog, made of wood, a bit of paint, a bit of string, and a bit of my friend Ike’s wax. That’s an ingenious toy, that is: who’ll have it? whose got a youngster?”
Speaking in a large printing-office, amongst twenty or thirty men, there was soon a market for the jumping frog; and then the old man drew out a scrap of something soft and flabby, and held it up.
“You wouldn’t tell what that is in a hurry,” said Matt. “All to encourage industry, you know; that’s a big indy-rubber balloon, that is, only I couldn’t pocket it, so I made it collapse first; so that’s no good to nobody – pitch it away. Here we have – ah, this is an out-and-out toy, this is, only I’ve broke the stick, and it wants a bit of glue – who’ll have a climbing monkey?”
And so the old man would pull out perhaps twenty toys, balls, dolls, gelatine cards, to the infinite amusement of his companions, who laughed on, but without discomposing Matt in the least, who practised his humble philanthropy as long as he had money, and often, in consequence, went without a meal; for saving was an utter impossibility with the old man – a feat, he said, he had often tried to accomplish; but how, he said, could a man keep money in his pocket when he saw others wanting? “It is done,” said Matt; “but old as I am, I can’t quite see it.”
But there had been no toy distributions lately, for old Matt had found times very hard, and even if they had been better, there would have been no more such amusements for the denizens of the offices he worked at, for there was another way for Matt’s philanthropical purchases to go, namely, to Carey-street, to Septimus Hardon’s little boy, for whose special benefit the old man had made several purchases on credit, which was freely accorded by those to whom he was known; but as to work at Septimus Hardon’s printing-office, there was none for him, further than that of disposing of type and materials at one or another of the brokers’, which duties he performed without recompense, grumbling sorely the while at the wretched sums he obtained for the goods.
“You ought to find fault then, sir,” he would say to Septimus; “I can’t help it; but I’m ashamed, that I am, to think that people will give such a beggarly price. It grieves me, sir, to see the stuff go like that.”
But Septimus did not find fault, only smiled feebly; for in this time of his sore distress he had so aged, and grown so helpless and wanting in reliance, that he trusted to the old compositor in almost everything.
“Might rob him right and left, sir,” said old Matt to a favourite lamp-post in Carey-street. “He’s no business up here at all. I could quarrel with him sometimes for being so simple, if it wasn’t that he’s such a thorough good sort at bottom. What’s to become of them when the things are all gone, goodness knows; for he’ll never do what I’ve done, sir – lived two days upon a large dose of sleep, a penn’orth of snuff, and three back numbers of the London Journal.”
For troubles now came thickly crowding on Septimus Hardon’s horizon. His wife’s health failed fast, and the means were wanting to procure her the necessary comforts. But there is always light behind the darkest cloud; and now it was that Lucy, young in years, but a woman in self-reliance, proved a stay to the family. Ever busily plying her needle, ever cheerful, she was a ray of sunshine in their sad home, shedding her brightness in the darkest hours. And though Septimus Hardon querulously complained of his standing so friendless in the world, there was another who watched anxiously the failing fortunes of the family, and was always ready with counsel and aid – the Reverend Arthur Sterne, who became more constant in his visits as the affairs of Septimus grew darker. Old Matt and he, too, often met, but somehow not without feelings of distrust on either side – distrust perhaps excusable on the side of the clergyman; for the ways of Matthew Space shed no softening lustre upon his outer man.
One day old Matt went into Carey-street to find the broker in possession; for Septimus was far behind with his heavy rent, and the landlord was alarmed at seeing his tenant’s worldly possessions shrinking at so rapid a rate; while, when the old man made his way into the sitting-room, he found weary-looking Septimus waiting with aching heart for a reply to the appealing letter he had sent to his father.
Old Matt went again, day after day, asking himself how he could be such an old idiot as to care for other people’s affairs to the neglect of his own; but there was always the same weary shake of the head, and the same answer – “No letter, Matt.”
At last there was a cart at the door, and Septimus Hardon, roused up into something like energy for the time being, busily helped old Matt to remove the remnants of his furniture to the rooms the old man had secured for him in that salubrious court, Bennett’s-rents.
“’Tain’t the nicest of spots,” old Matt had owned; “but then look at the convenience; and for what you are going to do, sir, you must be right on the spot; for though law’s very slow work for them as goes into it, it’s very quick, sharp work for them as does the copying.”
That evening Septimus Hardon looked dolefully round the front room of the two the old man had secured for him; then he glanced at his wife, who tried to smile; at Lucy, busily arranging; and lastly at old Matt, who looked very cheerful and happy as he helped Lucy in her arrangements, and was now lustily polishing a table that did not require it with a duster.
“Good luck to you, sir, don’t look like that; why, you’re fetching the tears into Miss Lucy’s eyes – as is quite bright enough without,” muttered Matt to himself. “Don’t be down, sir, the wheel’s always going round – bottom spokes to-day, top spokes to-morrow; and not the best place neither, for folks often knocks their heads through going too high. This ain’t nothing, bless you; this is riches, this is – cheerful prospect of ten foot in front; pigeons on the roof; birds a-singing upstairs; children a-rollicking in the court; orgin three times a-day; writers popping in and out at the corner this side, public at the corner on t’other – brown stout threepence a pot in your own jugs; side-view almost into Carey-street, through the alley. Why, you’re well off here, sir; and I’ve known the time when a ha’porth o’ snuff and a recess in one of the bridges has been board and lodging to me; and – Servant, sir. – Anything more I can do for you to-day, Mr Hardon? If not, I’ll go, sir,” said the old man, suddenly becoming very distant and respectful; for a new-comer appeared upon the scene in the shape of Mr Sterne; when, after a very stiff bow all round, old Matt departed, stumbling more than once as he descended the worn stairs.
Matthew Space’s cheerfulness was gone as soon as he left the court, and it took him some considerable time to reach his resting-place – a neighbouring public-house; for he was troubled and anxious, and had to stop every now and then to think; but he could not think aloud to his old friends the lamps, on account of its being daylight; though after an hour or two’s sojourn at first one and then another of his places of resort when making his way homewards, he paused frequently and long.
“Now I tell you what it is, sir!” he exclaimed, on stopping at the corner of Carey-street once more, and slapping a favourite post on the shoulder, “things are coming to a pretty pass; here we are sending our thousands to prison and penal servitude for dishonesty, robbery, and petty theft; and out of those thousands no end wanted to be honest, and we would not give them the chance. There are thousands wanting to get an honest living, and we won’t let them. Rogue, sir!” he cried, excitedly slapping the cold iron with such energy that his hand ached, “don’t tell me; you may talk of your charity and benevolence till all’s blue; but I mean to say that, in the eyes of the world, sir, there isn’t a greater rogue than a poor man. Beat him, kick him, turn him out, off with him – a vagabond, what business has he to be poor?”
Old Matt was out of breath, and strode on to another post.
“What business has he to be poor – a villain? What do we want with a Septimus Hardon, legal and general printer, and poor man? ‘Nothing at all,’ says the world, and it won’t go to his shop; ‘see him starve first,’ says the world; ‘we’ll go to the people who don’t want help, who keep their carriages and country-seats; and if the little men fail and become bankrupt, serve ’em right, too, what business had they to aspire? why weren’t they content as shopmen or journeymen? Too many already! Pooh! then let them get out. Let them plod and crawl, or turn agricultural labourers, and earn eight or nine shillings a-week. Won’t they get premiums, sir, for bringing up their families without parish help, eh? And what more can they want in this great and glorious land? Won’t that do? Well, then, let ’em go to the workhouse, where there’s every convenience for letting ’em die off out of the way.’”
The old man crossed the muddy street to another lamp, chuckling to himself the while, when, laying both hands upon the post, he began again: “It’s a strange thing, sir, a wonderful thing, how lonesome a man may be here in this great city of London: he may work till he drops for a living, and not get it; and he may then go and lie down and die, and all that, while nobody has known him or helped him; but when he’s found there’s a fuss in the papers for a few hours, and then – on we go again. We’re all wrong, sir. What’s the use of our spending our hundreds of thousands, sir, in converting a few Indians, or Africans, or Australians, sir, and then holding our meetings, with the Bishop of Somewhere-or-another coming home to hold forth upon the benefits that have followed the missionary enterprise, but saying nothing about the miseries that have followed wherever the white man has set his foot? Very fine, sir; very fine, this civilisation, and town and village and church springing up; but what has become of the Indian? what has become of the Australian? and what will become of the New Zealander? It’s aggrandisement from beginning to end, sir, – dead robbery; call it conquest if you will; but there, it’s all for the extension of our glorious empire. Let’s see, sir,” said Matt, stopping; “I’m getting it into a knot; what was I going to say? How dare we go on so busily cleaning other people’s houses when our own is in a state that we ought as a nation to blush for? Convert savages, benighted heathen! Why, I can take you, sir, where, here in the heart of this Christian city, London, you shall see savages ten times worse than any you shall find in Africa – more cruel, more licentious. There, hang it, sir, if it warn’t for the fear of being eaten, I’d sooner trust myself amongst the blacks ten times over than the whites, hang me if I wouldn’t! I know what you’ll say to me, sir! ‘Go and preach the Gospel to every creature!’ Ah, but oughtn’t we to be fit to do it first? oughtn’t we to look at home first? I say yes, sir, yes; and what we’re doing now, sir, ’s playing the Pharisee and whitening the outside of the sepulchre; and there’s no mistake about it, sir, some parts of this London of ours make a very foul sepulchre indeed.”