Title: Going into Society
Author: Dickens, Charles, 1812-1870
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Going into Society" ***


Transcribed from the 1894 Chapman and Hall edition of "Christmas Stories"


GOING INTO SOCIETY


At one period of its reverses, the House fell into the occupation of a
Showman.  He was found registered as its occupier, on the parish books of
the time when he rented the House, and there was therefore no need of any
clue to his name.  But, he himself was less easy to be found; for, he had
led a wandering life, and settled people had lost sight of him, and
people who plumed themselves on being respectable were shy of admitting
that they had ever known anything of him.  At last, among the marsh lands
near the river's level, that lie about Deptford and the neighbouring
market-gardens, a Grizzled Personage in velveteen, with a face so cut up
by varieties of weather that he looked as if he had been tattooed, was
found smoking a pipe at the door of a wooden house on wheels.  The wooden
house was laid up in ordinary for the winter, near the mouth of a muddy
creek; and everything near it, the foggy river, the misty marshes, and
the steaming market-gardens, smoked in company with the grizzled man.  In
the midst of this smoking party, the funnel-chimney of the wooden house
on wheels was not remiss, but took its pipe with the rest in a
companionable manner.

On being asked if it were he who had once rented the House to Let,
Grizzled Velveteen looked surprised, and said yes.  Then his name was
Magsman?  That was it, Toby Magsman--which lawfully christened Robert;
but called in the line, from a infant, Toby.  There was nothing agin Toby
Magsman, he believed?  If there was suspicion of such--mention it!

There was no suspicion of such, he might rest assured.  But, some
inquiries were making about that House, and would he object to say why he
left it?

Not at all; why should he?  He left it, along of a Dwarf.

Along of a Dwarf?

Mr. Magsman repeated, deliberately and emphatically, Along of a Dwarf.

Might it be compatible with Mr. Magsman's inclination and convenience to
enter, as a favour, into a few particulars?

Mr. Magsman entered into the following particulars.

It was a long time ago, to begin with;--afore lotteries and a deal more
was done away with.  Mr. Magsman was looking about for a good pitch, and
he see that house, and he says to himself, "I'll have you, if you're to
be had.  If money'll get you, I'll have you."

The neighbours cut up rough, and made complaints; but Mr. Magsman don't
know what they _would_ have had.  It was a lovely thing.  First of all,
there was the canvass, representin the picter of the Giant, in Spanish
trunks and a ruff, who was himself half the heighth of the house, and was
run up with a line and pulley to a pole on the roof, so that his Ed was
coeval with the parapet.  Then, there was the canvass, representin the
picter of the Albina lady, showing her white air to the Army and Navy in
correct uniform.  Then, there was the canvass, representin the picter of
the Wild Indian a scalpin a member of some foreign nation.  Then, there
was the canvass, representin the picter of a child of a British Planter,
seized by two Boa Constrictors--not that _we_ never had no child, nor no
Constrictors neither.  Similarly, there was the canvass, representin the
picter of the Wild Ass of the Prairies--not that _we_ never had no wild
asses, nor wouldn't have had 'em at a gift.  Last, there was the canvass,
representin the picter of the Dwarf, and like him too (considerin), with
George the Fourth in such a state of astonishment at him as His Majesty
couldn't with his utmost politeness and stoutness express.  The front of
the House was so covered with canvasses, that there wasn't a spark of
daylight ever visible on that side.  "MAGSMAN'S AMUSEMENTS," fifteen foot
long by two foot high, ran over the front door and parlour winders.  The
passage was a Arbour of green baize and gardenstuff.  A barrel-organ
performed there unceasing.  And as to respectability,--if threepence
ain't respectable, what is?

But, the Dwarf is the principal article at present, and he was worth the
money.  He was wrote up as MAJOR TPSCHOFFKI, OF THE IMPERIAL BULGRADERIAN
BRIGADE.  Nobody couldn't pronounce the name, and it never was intended
anybody should.  The public always turned it, as a regular rule, into
Chopski.  In the line he was called Chops; partly on that account, and
partly because his real name, if he ever had any real name (which was
very dubious), was Stakes.

He was a uncommon small man, he really was.  Certainly not so small as he
was made out to be, but where _is_ your Dwarf as is?  He was a most
uncommon small man, with a most uncommon large Ed; and what he had inside
that Ed, nobody ever knowed but himself: even supposin himself to have
ever took stock of it, which it would have been a stiff job for even him
to do.

The kindest little man as never growed!  Spirited, but not proud.  When
he travelled with the Spotted Baby--though he knowed himself to be a
nat'ral Dwarf, and knowed the Baby's spots to be put upon him artificial,
he nursed that Baby like a mother.  You never heerd him give a ill-name
to a Giant.  He _did_ allow himself to break out into strong language
respectin the Fat Lady from Norfolk; but that was an affair of the 'art;
and when a man's 'art has been trifled with by a lady, and the preference
giv to a Indian, he ain't master of his actions.

He was always in love, of course; every human nat'ral phenomenon is.  And
he was always in love with a large woman; I never knowed the Dwarf as
could be got to love a small one.  Which helps to keep 'em the
Curiosities they are.

One sing'ler idea he had in that Ed of his, which must have meant
something, or it wouldn't have been there.  It was always his opinion
that he was entitled to property.  He never would put his name to
anything.  He had been taught to write, by the young man without arms,
who got his living with his toes (quite a writing master _he_ was, and
taught scores in the line), but Chops would have starved to death, afore
he'd have gained a bit of bread by putting his hand to a paper.  This is
the more curious to bear in mind, because HE had no property, nor hope of
property, except his house and a sarser.  When I say his house, I mean
the box, painted and got up outside like a reg'lar six-roomer, that he
used to creep into, with a diamond ring (or quite as good to look at) on
his forefinger, and ring a little bell out of what the Public believed to
be the Drawing-room winder.  And when I say a sarser, I mean a Chaney
sarser in which he made a collection for himself at the end of every
Entertainment.  His cue for that, he took from me: "Ladies and gentlemen,
the little man will now walk three times round the Cairawan, and retire
behind the curtain."  When he said anything important, in private life,
he mostly wound it up with this form of words, and they was generally the
last thing he said to me at night afore he went to bed.

He had what I consider a fine mind--a poetic mind.  His ideas respectin
his property never come upon him so strong as when he sat upon a barrel-
organ and had the handle turned.  Arter the wibration had run through him
a little time, he would screech out, "Toby, I feel my property
coming--grind away!  I'm counting my guineas by thousands, Toby--grind
away!  Toby, I shall be a man of fortun!  I feel the Mint a jingling in
me, Toby, and I'm swelling out into the Bank of England!"  Such is the
influence of music on a poetic mind.  Not that he was partial to any
other music but a barrel-organ; on the contrary, hated it.

He had a kind of a everlasting grudge agin the Public: which is a thing
you may notice in many phenomenons that get their living out of it.  What
riled him most in the nater of his occupation was, that it kep him out of
Society.  He was continiwally saying, "Toby, my ambition is, to go into
Society.  The curse of my position towards the Public is, that it keeps
me hout of Society.  This don't signify to a low beast of a Indian; he
an't formed for Society.  This don't signify to a Spotted Baby; _he_ an't
formed for Society.--I am."

Nobody never could make out what Chops done with his money.  He had a
good salary, down on the drum every Saturday as the day came round,
besides having the run of his teeth--and he was a Woodpecker to eat--but
all Dwarfs are.  The sarser was a little income, bringing him in so many
halfpence that he'd carry 'em for a week together, tied up in a pocket-
handkercher.  And yet he never had money.  And it couldn't be the Fat
Lady from Norfolk, as was once supposed; because it stands to reason that
when you have a animosity towards a Indian, which makes you grind your
teeth at him to his face, and which can hardly hold you from Goosing him
audible when he's going through his War-Dance--it stands to reason you
wouldn't under them circumstances deprive yourself, to support that
Indian in the lap of luxury.

Most unexpected, the mystery come out one day at Egham Races.  The Public
was shy of bein pulled in, and Chops was ringin his little bell out of
his drawing-room winder, and was snarlin to me over his shoulder as he
kneeled down with his legs out at the back-door--for he couldn't be
shoved into his house without kneeling down, and the premises wouldn't
accommodate his legs--was snarlin, "Here's a precious Public for you; why
the Devil don't they tumble up?" when a man in the crowd holds up a
carrier-pigeon, and cries out, "If there's any person here as has got a
ticket, the Lottery's just drawed, and the number as has come up for the
great prize is three, seven, forty-two!  Three, seven, forty-two!"  I was
givin the man to the Furies myself, for calling off the Public's
attention--for the Public will turn away, at any time, to look at
anything in preference to the thing showed 'em; and if you doubt it, get
'em together for any indiwidual purpose on the face of the earth, and
send only two people in late, and see if the whole company an't far more
interested in takin particular notice of them two than of you--I say, I
wasn't best pleased with the man for callin out, and wasn't blessin him
in my own mind, when I see Chops's little bell fly out of winder at a old
lady, and he gets up and kicks his box over, exposin the whole secret,
and he catches hold of the calves of my legs and he says to me, "Carry me
into the wan, Toby, and throw a pail of water over me or I'm a dead man,
for I've come into my property!"

Twelve thousand odd hundred pound, was Chops's winnins.  He had bought a
half-ticket for the twenty-five thousand prize, and it had come up.  The
first use he made of his property, was, to offer to fight the Wild Indian
for five hundred pound a side, him with a poisoned darnin-needle and the
Indian with a club; but the Indian being in want of backers to that
amount, it went no further.

Arter he had been mad for a week--in a state of mind, in short, in which,
if I had let him sit on the organ for only two minutes, I believe he
would have bust--but we kep the organ from him--Mr. Chops come round, and
behaved liberal and beautiful to all.  He then sent for a young man he
knowed, as had a wery genteel appearance and was a Bonnet at a gaming-
booth (most respectable brought up, father havin been imminent in the
livery stable line but unfort'nate in a commercial crisis, through
paintin a old gray, ginger-bay, and sellin him with a Pedigree), and Mr.
Chops said to this Bonnet, who said his name was Normandy, which it
wasn't:

"Normandy, I'm a goin into Society.  Will you go with me?"

Says Normandy: "Do I understand you, Mr. Chops, to hintimate that the
'ole of the expenses of that move will be borne by yourself?"

"Correct," says Mr. Chops.  "And you shall have a Princely allowance
too."

The Bonnet lifted Mr. Chops upon a chair, to shake hands with him, and
replied in poetry, with his eyes seemingly full of tears:

   "My boat is on the shore,
   And my bark is on the sea,
   And I do not ask for more,
   But I'll Go:--along with thee."

They went into Society, in a chay and four grays with silk jackets.  They
took lodgings in Pall Mall, London, and they blazed away.

In consequence of a note that was brought to Bartlemy Fair in the autumn
of next year by a servant, most wonderful got up in milk-white cords and
tops, I cleaned myself and went to Pall Mall, one evening appinted.  The
gentlemen was at their wine arter dinner, and Mr. Chops's eyes was more
fixed in that Ed of his than I thought good for him.  There was three of
'em (in company, I mean), and I knowed the third well.  When last met, he
had on a white Roman shirt, and a bishop's mitre covered with leopard-
skin, and played the clarionet all wrong, in a band at a Wild Beast Show.

This gent took on not to know me, and Mr. Chops said: "Gentlemen, this is
a old friend of former days:" and Normandy looked at me through a eye-
glass, and said, "Magsman, glad to see you!"--which I'll take my oath he
wasn't.  Mr. Chops, to git him convenient to the table, had his chair on
a throne (much of the form of George the Fourth's in the canvass), but he
hardly appeared to me to be King there in any other pint of view, for his
two gentlemen ordered about like Emperors.  They was all dressed like May-
Day--gorgeous!--And as to Wine, they swam in all sorts.

I made the round of the bottles, first separate (to say I had done it),
and then mixed 'em all together (to say I had done it), and then tried
two of 'em as half-and-half, and then t'other two.  Altogether, I passed
a pleasin evenin, but with a tendency to feel muddled, until I considered
it good manners to get up and say, "Mr. Chops, the best of friends must
part, I thank you for the wariety of foreign drains you have stood so
'ansome, I looks towards you in red wine, and I takes my leave."  Mr.
Chops replied, "If you'll just hitch me out of this over your right arm,
Magsman, and carry me down-stairs, I'll see you out."  I said I couldn't
think of such a thing, but he would have it, so I lifted him off his
throne.  He smelt strong of Maideary, and I couldn't help thinking as I
carried him down that it was like carrying a large bottle full of wine,
with a rayther ugly stopper, a good deal out of proportion.

When I set him on the door-mat in the hall, he kep me close to him by
holding on to my coat-collar, and he whispers:

"I ain't 'appy, Magsman."

"What's on your mind, Mr. Chops?"

"They don't use me well.  They an't grateful to me.  They puts me on the
mantel-piece when I won't have in more Champagne-wine, and they locks me
in the sideboard when I won't give up my property."

"Get rid of 'em, Mr. Chops."

"I can't.  We're in Society together, and what would Society say?"

"Come out of Society!" says I.

"I can't.  You don't know what you're talking about.  When you have once
gone into Society, you mustn't come out of it."

"Then if you'll excuse the freedom, Mr. Chops," were my remark, shaking
my head grave, "I think it's a pity you ever went in."

Mr. Chops shook that deep Ed of his, to a surprisin extent, and slapped
it half a dozen times with his hand, and with more Wice than I thought
were in him.  Then, he says, "You're a good fellow, but you don't
understand.  Good-night, go along.  Magsman, the little man will now walk
three times round the Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain."  The last
I see of him on that occasion was his tryin, on the extremest werge of
insensibility, to climb up the stairs, one by one, with his hands and
knees.  They'd have been much too steep for him, if he had been sober;
but he wouldn't be helped.

It warn't long after that, that I read in the newspaper of Mr. Chops's
being presented at court.  It was printed, "It will be recollected"--and
I've noticed in my life, that it is sure to be printed that it _will_ be
recollected, whenever it won't--"that Mr. Chops is the individual of
small stature, whose brilliant success in the last State Lottery
attracted so much attention."  Well, I says to myself, Such is Life!  He
has been and done it in earnest at last.  He has astonished George the
Fourth!

(On account of which, I had that canvass new-painted, him with a bag of
money in his hand, a presentin it to George the Fourth, and a lady in
Ostrich Feathers fallin in love with him in a bag-wig, sword, and buckles
correct.)

I took the House as is the subject of present inquiries--though not the
honour of bein acquainted--and I run Magsman's Amusements in it thirteen
months--sometimes one thing, sometimes another, sometimes nothin
particular, but always all the canvasses outside.  One night, when we had
played the last company out, which was a shy company, through its raining
Heavens hard, I was takin a pipe in the one pair back along with the
young man with the toes, which I had taken on for a month (though he
never drawed--except on paper), and I heard a kickin at the street door.
"Halloa!" I says to the young man, "what's up!"  He rubs his eyebrows
with his toes, and he says, "I can't imagine, Mr. Magsman"--which he
never could imagine nothin, and was monotonous company.

The noise not leavin off, I laid down my pipe, and I took up a candle,
and I went down and opened the door.  I looked out into the street; but
nothin could I see, and nothin was I aware of, until I turned round
quick, because some creetur run between my legs into the passage.  There
was Mr. Chops!

"Magsman," he says, "take me, on the old terms, and you've got me; if
it's done, say done!"

I was all of a maze, but I said, "Done, sir."

"Done to your done, and double done!" says he.  "Have you got a bit of
supper in the house?"

Bearin in mind them sparklin warieties of foreign drains as we'd guzzled
away at in Pall Mall, I was ashamed to offer him cold sassages and gin-
and-water; but he took 'em both and took 'em free; havin a chair for his
table, and sittin down at it on a stool, like hold times.  I, all of a
maze all the while.

It was arter he had made a clean sweep of the sassages (beef, and to the
best of my calculations two pound and a quarter), that the wisdom as was
in that little man began to come out of him like prespiration.

"Magsman," he says, "look upon me!  You see afore you, One as has both
gone into Society and come out."

"O!  You _are_ out of it, Mr. Chops?  How did you get out, sir?"

"SOLD OUT!" says he.  You never saw the like of the wisdom as his Ed
expressed, when he made use of them two words.

"My friend Magsman, I'll impart to you a discovery I've made.  It's
wallable; it's cost twelve thousand five hundred pound; it may do you
good in life--The secret of this matter is, that it ain't so much that a
person goes into Society, as that Society goes into a person."

Not exactly keepin up with his meanin, I shook my head, put on a deep
look, and said, "You're right there, Mr. Chops."

"Magsman," he says, twitchin me by the leg, "Society has gone into me, to
the tune of every penny of my property."

I felt that I went pale, and though nat'rally a bold speaker, I couldn't
hardly say, "Where's Normandy?"

"Bolted.  With the plate," said Mr. Chops.

"And t'other one?" meaning him as formerly wore the bishop's mitre.

"Bolted.  With the jewels," said Mr. Chops.

I sat down and looked at him, and he stood up and looked at me.

"Magsman," he says, and he seemed to myself to get wiser as he got
hoarser; "Society, taken in the lump, is all dwarfs.  At the court of St.
James's, they was all a doing my old business--all a goin three times
round the Cairawan, in the hold court-suits and properties.  Elsewheres,
they was most of 'em ringin their little bells out of make-believes.
Everywheres, the sarser was a goin round.  Magsman, the sarser is the
uniwersal Institution!"

I perceived, you understand, that he was soured by his misfortunes, and I
felt for Mr. Chops.

"As to Fat Ladies," he says, giving his head a tremendious one agin the
wall, "there's lots of _them_ in Society, and worse than the original.
_Hers_ was a outrage upon Taste--simply a outrage upon Taste--awakenin
contempt--carryin its own punishment in the form of a Indian."  Here he
giv himself another tremendious one.  "But _theirs_, Magsman, _theirs_ is
mercenary outrages.  Lay in Cashmeer shawls, buy bracelets, strew 'em and
a lot of 'andsome fans and things about your rooms, let it be known that
you give away like water to all as come to admire, and the Fat Ladies
that don't exhibit for so much down upon the drum, will come from all the
pints of the compass to flock about you, whatever you are.  They'll drill
holes in your 'art, Magsman, like a Cullender.  And when you've no more
left to give, they'll laugh at you to your face, and leave you to have
your bones picked dry by Wulturs, like the dead Wild Ass of the Prairies
that you deserve to be!"  Here he giv himself the most tremendious one of
all, and dropped.

I thought he was gone.  His Ed was so heavy, and he knocked it so hard,
and he fell so stoney, and the sassagerial disturbance in him must have
been so immense, that I thought he was gone.  But, he soon come round
with care, and he sat up on the floor, and he said to me, with wisdom
comin out of his eyes, if ever it come:

"Magsman!  The most material difference between the two states of
existence through which your unhappy friend has passed;" he reached out
his poor little hand, and his tears dropped down on the moustachio which
it was a credit to him to have done his best to grow, but it is not in
mortals to command success,--"the difference this.  When I was out of
Society, I was paid light for being seen.  When I went into Society, I
paid heavy for being seen.  I prefer the former, even if I wasn't forced
upon it.  Give me out through the trumpet, in the hold way, to-morrow."

Arter that, he slid into the line again as easy as if he had been iled
all over.  But the organ was kep from him, and no allusions was ever
made, when a company was in, to his property.  He got wiser every day;
his views of Society and the Public was luminous, bewilderin, awful; and
his Ed got bigger and bigger as his Wisdom expanded it.

He took well, and pulled 'em in most excellent for nine weeks.  At the
expiration of that period, when his Ed was a sight, he expressed one
evenin, the last Company havin been turned out, and the door shut, a wish
to have a little music.

"Mr. Chops," I said (I never dropped the "Mr." with him; the world might
do it, but not me); "Mr. Chops, are you sure as you are in a state of
mind and body to sit upon the organ?"

His answer was this: "Toby, when next met with on the tramp, I forgive
her and the Indian.  And I am."

It was with fear and trembling that I began to turn the handle; but he
sat like a lamb.  I will be my belief to my dying day, that I see his Ed
expand as he sat; you may therefore judge how great his thoughts was.  He
sat out all the changes, and then he come off.

"Toby," he says, with a quiet smile, "the little man will now walk three
times round the Cairawan, and retire behind the curtain."

When we called him in the morning, we found him gone into a much better
Society than mine or Pall Mall's.  I giv Mr. Chops as comfortable a
funeral as lay in my power, followed myself as Chief, and had the George
the Fourth canvass carried first, in the form of a banner.  But, the
House was so dismal arterwards, that I giv it up, and took to the Wan
again.

* * * * *

"I don't triumph," said Jarber, folding up the second manuscript, and
looking hard at Trottle.  "I don't triumph over this worthy creature.  I
merely ask him if he is satisfied now?"

"How can he be anything else?" I said, answering for Trottle, who sat
obstinately silent.  "This time, Jarber, you have not only read us a
delightfully amusing story, but you have also answered the question about
the House.  Of course it stands empty now.  Who would think of taking it
after it had been turned into a caravan?"  I looked at Trottle, as I said
those last words, and Jarber waved his hand indulgently in the same
direction.

"Let this excellent person speak," said Jarber.  "You were about to say,
my good man?"--

"I only wished to ask, sir," said Trottle doggedly, "if you could kindly
oblige me with a date or two in connection with that last story?"

"A date!" repeated Jarber.  "What does the man want with dates!"

"I should be glad to know, with great respect," persisted Trottle, "if
the person named Magsman was the last tenant who lived in the House.  It's
my opinion--if I may be excused for giving it--that he most decidedly was
not."

With those words, Trottle made a low bow, and quietly left the room.

There is no denying that Jarber, when we were left together, looked sadly
discomposed.  He had evidently forgotten to inquire about dates; and, in
spite of his magnificent talk about his series of discoveries, it was
quite as plain that the two stories he had just read, had really and
truly exhausted his present stock.  I thought myself bound, in common
gratitude, to help him out of his embarrassment by a timely suggestion.
So I proposed that he should come to tea again, on the next Monday
evening, the thirteenth, and should make such inquiries in the meantime,
as might enable him to dispose triumphantly of Trottle's objection.

He gallantly kissed my hand, made a neat little speech of acknowledgment,
and took his leave.  For the rest of the week I would not encourage
Trottle by allowing him to refer to the House at all.  I suspected he was
making his own inquiries about dates, but I put no questions to him.

On Monday evening, the thirteenth, that dear unfortunate Jarber came,
punctual to the appointed time.  He looked so terribly harassed, that he
was really quite a spectacle of feebleness and fatigue.  I saw, at a
glance, that the question of dates had gone against him, that Mr. Magsman
had not been the last tenant of the House, and that the reason of its
emptiness was still to seek.

"What I have gone through," said Jarber, "words are not eloquent enough
to tell.  O Sophonisba, I have begun another series of discoveries!
Accept the last two as stories laid on your shrine; and wait to blame me
for leaving your curiosity unappeased, until you have heard Number
Three."

Number Three looked like a very short manuscript, and I said as much.
Jarber explained to me that we were to have some poetry this time.  In
the course of his investigations he had stepped into the Circulating
Library, to seek for information on the one important subject.  All the
Library-people knew about the House was, that a female relative of the
last tenant, as they believed, had, just after that tenant left, sent a
little manuscript poem to them which she described as referring to events
that had actually passed in the House; and which she wanted the
proprietor of the Library to publish.  She had written no address on her
letter; and the proprietor had kept the manuscript ready to be given back
to her (the publishing of poems not being in his line) when she might
call for it.  She had never called for it; and the poem had been lent to
Jarber, at his express request, to read to me.

Before he began, I rang the bell for Trottle; being determined to have
him present at the new reading, as a wholesome check on his obstinacy.  To
my surprise Peggy answered the bell, and told me, that Trottle had
stepped out without saying where.  I instantly felt the strongest
possible conviction that he was at his old tricks: and that his stepping
out in the evening, without leave, meant--Philandering.

Controlling myself on my visitor's account, I dismissed Peggy, stifled my
indignation, and prepared, as politely as might be, to listen to Jarber.





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