Mr. Punch's Book of Love: Being the Humours of Courtship and Matrimony by Hammerton et al. (books to read to get smarter TXT) 📕

LOOKING AFTER THE CHAPS

From Mr. Norman Dormer, Architect and Surveyor, to Miss Caroline Tower.

My Precious,

Pity me who must stay and fret in London, while you are enjoying yourself at Broadstairs. How I long to be there, surveying the ocean by your side, and tracing your dear name on the sands! But fate and a father have placed a barrier between us. So I pace up and down before the old house in T———— Square, and look up at a certain dormitory on the second story—in no state of elevation you may be sure—and make plans for the future, and build castles in the air, and try to forget that my designs on your heart appear ridiculous to your papa, whose estimate of me I am aware is not in excess. For can I forget what he said that wet Saturday afternoon in the back drawing-room, when I tendered myself to him as a son-in-law, and the tender was not accepted? After telling him that it was the summit, the pinnacle of my ambition to win you [Pg 84] as my wife, did he not answer that he considered I ought not to aspire to your hand until the statement of my pecuniary means (as he worded it) was more satisfactory, and, meanwhile, requested me to discontinue my pointed attentions? Never until you bid me. Only be firm, and the difficulties now in our way will but serve to cement us more closely together; only be true and I will wait patiently for that day which shall put the coping-stone to my happiness. I build upon every word, every look, every smile I can call to mind. You will write and assure me there is no foundation for the report of another and more fortunate competitor, but that I still fill the same niche in your affections I ever did? For, Caroline, were I to hear you were an "engaged" Tower, I could not survive the blow. I should stab myself with my compasses in the back office.

But away with such gloomy fears. Let me picture her to myself. How plumb she stands! How arch she looks! What a beam in her eye! What a graceful curve in her neck! What an exquisitely chiselled nose! What a brick of a girl altogether! I must stop in my specification, [Pg 88] or you will think there is something wrong in my upper story, and not give credence to a word I say.

I have just been calling on your sister, and saw your little pet Poppy, who talked in her pretty Early English about "Tant Tarry." Aunt Sarah was there, staying the day, looking as medi�val as ever, and with her hair dressed in the usual Decorated style. She hinted that you were imperious, and that any man who married you must make up his mind (grim joke) to fetch and Carry at your bidding. And then you were so ambitious! The wiseacre! why, I will leave no stone unturned to get on in my profession if you will only be constant. I will be the architect of my own fortunes—your love the keystone of my prosperity. The columns of every newspaper shall record my success; every capital in Europe shall know my name. She did not unhinge me a bit, and the shafts of her ridicule fell harmless; although, she made an allusion to "dumpy" men, which I knew was levelled at me, and sneered at married life as very pretty for a time, but the stucco soon fell off. Poor Aunt Sarah! I left her sitting up quite [Pg 92] perpendicular with that everlasting work which she is always herring-boning. And now, Carry, darling—oh, dear! I am wanted about something in our designs for the new Law Courts, and have only time to sign myself,

Your own, till Domesday, Norman.

From Mr. Alfred Pye, Professed Man Cook, to
Miss Martha Browning.

What a stew I was in all Friday, when no letter came from my Patty! Everything went wrong. I made a hash of one of my entr�es, and the chef, who guessed the cause of my confusion, roasted me so that at last I boiled over, and gave him rather a tart answer, for, as you know, I am at times a little too peppery. Thy sweet note, when it did arrive, made all right. I believe I was quite foolish, and went capering about with delight. And then I cooled down, and composed a new souffl�. So you see I do not fritter away all my time, whatever those malicious people who are so ready to carp at me may think.

You say you always like to know where I go in an evening. Well, I went to the Trotters last night, and Fanny played the accompaniment, and[Pg 96] I sang—how it made me think of you!—"Good-bye, Sweetbread, good-bye!" (How absurd! Do you see what I have written instead of "Sweetheart"? All the force of habit. It will remind you of that night at Cookham, when we were the top couple in the supper quadrille, and I shouted, "Now, Side-dishes, begin!" and everybody roared except a certain young lady, who looked a trifle vexed. Don't you remember that Spring? You must, because the young potatoes were so small.)

Your prot�g�, Peter, goes on famously. He's a broth of a boy, not a pickle, like many lads of his age, and yet he won't stand being sauced, as he calls it. He and I nearly got parted at the station, for the crowd was very great after the races—in fact, a regular jam. It rained hard when we reached Sandwich, and I got dripping wet, for I had forgotten my waterproof, and there was not a cab to be had. But now the weather has changed again, and we are half baked. A broiling sun and not a puff of wind.

There was no one in the train I knew. Some small fry stuffing buns all the way, and opposite[Pg 98] me a girl who had her hair crimped just like yours, and wore exactly the same