two of the many passengers by a certain late sunday evening train, mr. thomas idle and mr. francis goodchild, yielded up their tickets at a little rotten platform (converted into artificial touchwood by smoke and ashes), deep in the manufacturing bosom of yorkshire. a mysterious bosom it appeared, upon a damp, dark, sunday night, dashed through in the train to the music of the whirling wheels, the panting of the engine, and the part-singing of hundreds of third-class excursionists, whose vocal efforts ‘bobbed arayound’ from sacred to profane, from hymns, to our transatlantic sisters the yankee gal and mairy anne, in a remarkable way. there seemed to have been some large vocal gathering near to every lonely station on the line. no town was visible, no village was visible, no light was visible; but, a multitude got out singing, and a multitude got in singing, and the second multitude took up the hymns, and adopted our transatlantic sisters, and sang of their own egregious wickedness, and of their bobbing arayound, and of how the ship it was ready and the wind it was fair, and they were bayound for the sea, mairy anne, until they in their turn became a getting-out multitude, and were replaced by another getting-in multitude, who did the same. and at every station, the getting-in multitude, with an artistic reference to the completeness of their chorus, incessantly cried, as with one voice while scuffling into the carriages, ‘we mun aa’ gang toogither!’
the singing and the multitudes had trailed off as the lonely places were left and the great towns were neared, and the way had lain as silently as a train’s way ever can, over the vague black streets of the great gulfs of towns, and among their branchless woods of vague black chimneys. these towns looked, in the cinderous wet, as though they had one and all been on fire and were just put out—a dreary and quenched panorama, many miles long.
thus, thomas and francis got to leeds; of which enterprising and important commercial centre it may be observed with delicacy, that you must either like it very much or not at all. next day, the first of the race-week, they took train to doncaster.
and instantly the character, both of travellers and of luggage, entirely changed, and no other business than race-business any longer existed on the face of the earth. the talk was all of horses and ‘john scott.’ guards whispered behind their hands to station-masters, of horses and john scott. men in cut-away coats and speckled cravats fastened with peculiar pins, and with the large bones of their legs developed under tight trousers, so that they should look as much as possible like horses’ legs, paced up and down by twos at junction-stations, speaking low and moodily of horses and john scott. the young clergyman in the black strait-waistcoat, who occupied the middle seat of the carriage, expounded in his peculiar pulpit-accent to the young and lovely reverend mrs. crinoline, who occupied the opposite middle-seat, a few passages of rumour relative to ‘oartheth, my love, and mithter john eth-cott.’ a bandy vagabond, with a head like a dutch cheese, in a fustian stable-suit, attending on a horse-box and going about the platforms with a halter hanging round his neck like a calais burgher of the ancient period much degenerated, was courted by the best society, by reason of what he had to hint, when not engaged in eating straw, concerning ‘t’harses and joon scott.’ the engine-driver himself, as he applied one eye to his large stationary double-eye-glass on the engine, seemed to keep the other open, sideways, upon horses and john scott.
breaks and barriers at doncaster station to keep the crowd off; temporary wooden avenues of ingress and egress, to help the crowd on. forty extra porters sent down for this present blessed race-week, and all of them making up their betting-books in the lamp-room or somewhere else, and none of them to come and touch the luggage. travellers disgorged into an open space, a howling wilderness of idle men. all work but race-work at a stand-still; all men at a stand-still. ‘ey my word! deant ask noon o’ us to help wi’ t’luggage. bock your opinion loike a mon. coom! dang it, coom, t’harses and joon scott!’ in the midst of the idle men, all the fly horses and omnibus horses of doncaster and parts adjacent, rampant, rearing, backing, plunging, shying—apparently the result of their hearing of nothing but their own order and john scott.
grand dramatic company from london for the race-week. poses plastiques in the grand assembly room up the stable-yard at seven and nine each evening, for the race-week. grand alliance circus in the field beyond the bridge, for the race-week. grand exhibition of aztec lilliputians, important to all who want to be horrified cheap, for the race-week. lodgings, grand and not grand, but all at grand prices, ranging from ten pounds to twenty, for the grand race-week!
rendered giddy enough by these things, messieurs idle and goodchild repaired to the quarters they had secured beforehand, and mr. goodchild looked down from the window into the surging street.
‘by heaven, tom!’ cried he, after contemplating it, ‘i am in the lunatic asylum again, and these are all mad people under the charge of a body of designing keepers!’
all through the race-week, mr. goodchild never divested himself of this idea. every day he looked out of window, with something of the dread of lemuel gulliver looking down at men after he returned home from the horse-country; and every day he saw the lunatics, horse-mad, betting-mad, drunken-mad, vice-mad, and the designing keepers always after them. the idea pervaded, like the second colour in shot-silk, the whole of mr. goodchild’s impressions. they were much as follows:
monday, mid-day. races not to begin until to-morrow, but all the mob-lunatics out, crowding the pavements of the one main street of pretty and pleasant doncaster, crowding the road, particularly crowding the outside of the betting rooms, whooping and shouting loudly after all passing vehicles. frightened lunatic horses occasionally running away, with infinite clatter. all degrees of men, from peers to paupers, betting incessantly. keepers very watchful, and taking all good chances. an awful family likeness among the keepers, to mr. palmer and mr. thurtell. with some knowledge of expression and some acquaintance with heads (thus writes mr. goodchild), i never have seen anywhere, so many repetitions of one class of countenance and one character of head (both evil) as in this street at this time. cunning, covetousness, secrecy, cold calculation, hard callousness and dire insensibility, are the uniform keeper characteristics. mr. palmer passes me five times in five minutes, and, so i go down the street, the back of mr. thurtell’s skull is always going on before me.
monday evening. town lighted up; more lunatics out than ever; a complete choke and stoppage of the thoroughfare outside the betting rooms. keepers, having dined, pervade the betting rooms, and sharply snap at the moneyed lunatics. some keepers flushed with drink, and some not, but all close and calculating. a vague echoing roar of ‘t’harses’ and ‘t’races’ always rising in the air, until midnight, at about which period it dies away in occasional drunken songs and straggling yells. but, all night, some unmannerly drinking-house in the neighbourhood opens its mouth at intervals and spits out a man too drunk to be retained: who thereupon makes what uproarious protest may be left in him, and either falls asleep where he tumbles, or is carried off in custody.
tuesday morning, at daybreak. a sudden rising, as it were out of the earth, of all the obscene creatures, who sell ‘correct cards of the races.’ they may have been coiled in corners, or sleeping on door-steps, and, having all passed the night under the same set of circumstances, may all want to circulate their blood at the same time; but, however that may be, they spring into existence all at once and together, as though a new cadmus had sown a race-horse’s teeth. there is nobody up, to buy the cards; but, the cards are madly cried. there is no patronage to quarrel for; but, they madly quarrel and fight. conspicuous among these hy?nas, as breakfast-time discloses, is a fearful creature in the general semblance of a man: shaken off his next-to-no legs by drink and devilry, bare-headed and bare-footed, with a great shock of hair like a horrible broom, and nothing on him but a ragged pair of trousers and a pink glazed-calico coat—made on him—so very tight that it is as evident that he could never take it off, as that he never does. this hideous apparition, inconceivably drunk, has a terrible power of making a gong-like imitation of the braying of an ass: which feat requires that he should lay his right jaw in his begrimed right paw, double himself up, and shake his bray out of himself, with much staggering on his next-to-no legs, and much twirling of his horrible broom, as if it were a mop. from the present minute, when he comes in sight holding up his cards to the windows, and hoarsely proposing purchase to my lord, your excellency, colonel, the noble captain, and your honourable worship—from the present minute until the grand race-week is finished, at all hours of the morning, evening, day, and night, shall the town reverberate, at capricious intervals, to the brays of this frightful animal the gong-donkey.
no very great racing to-day, so no very great amount of vehicles: though there is a good sprinkling, too: from farmers’ carts and gigs, to carriages with post-horses and to fours-in-hand, mostly coming by the road from york, and passing on straight through the main street to the course. a walk in the wrong direction may be a better thing for mr. goodchild to-day than the course, so he walks in the wrong direction. everybody gone to the races. only children in the street. grand alliance circus deserted; not one star-rider left; omnibus which forms the pay-place, having on separate panels pay here for the boxes, pay here for the pit, pay here for the gallery, hove down in a corner and locked up; nobody near the tent but the man on his knees on the grass, who is making the paper balloons for the star young gentlemen to jump through to-night. a pleasant road, pleasantly wooded. no labourers working in the fields; all gone ‘t’races.’ the few late wenders of their way ‘t’races,’ who are yet left driving on the road, stare in amazement at the recluse who is not going ‘t’races.’ roadside innkeeper has gone ‘t’races.’ turnpike-man has gone ‘t’races.’ his thrifty wife, washing clothes at the toll-house door, is going ‘t’races’ to-morrow. perhaps there may be no one left to take the toll to-morrow; who knows? though assuredly that would be neither turnpike-like nor yorkshire-like. the very wind and dust seem to be hurrying ‘t’races,’ as they briskly pass the only wayfarer on the road. in the distance, the railway engine, waiting at the town-end, shrieks despairingly. nothing but the difficulty of getting off the line, restrains that engine from going ‘t’races,’ too, it is very clear.
at night, more lunatics out than last night—and more keepers. the latter very active at the betting rooms, the street in front of which is now impassable. mr. palmer as before. mr. thurtell as before. roar and uproar as before. gradual subsidence as before. unmannerly drinking-house expectorates as before. drunken negro-melodists, gong-donkey, and correct cards, in the night.
on wednesday morning, the morning of the great st. leger, it becomes apparent that there has been a great influx since yesterday, both of lunatics and keepers. the families of the tradesmen over the way are no longer within human ken; their places know them no more; ten, fifteen, and twenty guinea-lodgers fill them. at the pastry-cook’s second-floor window, a keeper is brushing mr. thurtell’s hair—thinking it his own. in the wax-chandler’s attic, another keeper is putting on mr. palmer’s braces. in the gunsmith’s nursery, a lunatic is shaving himself. in the serious stationer’s best sitting-room, three lunatics are taking a combination-breakfast, praising the (cook’s) devil, and drinking neat brandy in an atmosphere of last midnight’s cigars. no family sanctuary is free from our angelic messengers—we put up at the angel—who in the guise of extra waiters for the grand race-week, rattle in and out of the most secret chambers of everybody’s house, with dishes and tin covers, decanters, soda-water bottles, and glasses. an hour later. down the street and up the street, as far as eyes can see and a good deal farther, there is a dense crowd; outside the betting rooms it is like a great struggle at a theatre door—in the days of theatres; or at the vestibule of the spurgeon temple—in the days of spurgeon. an hour later. fusing into this crowd, and somehow getting through it, are all kinds of conveyances, and all kinds of foot-passengers; carts, with brick-makers and brick-makeresses jolting up and down on planks; drags, with the needful grooms behind, sitting cross-armed in the needful manner, and slanting themselves backward from the soles of their boots at the needful angle; postboys, in the shining hats and smart jackets of the olden time, when stokers were not; beautiful yorkshire horses, gallantly driven by their own breeders and masters. under every pole, and every shaft, and every horse, and every wheel as it would seem, the gong-donkey—metallically braying, when not struggling for life, or whipped out of the way.
by one o’clock, all this stir has gone out of the streets, and there is no one left in them but francis goodchild. francis goodchild will not be left in them long; for, he too is on his way, ‘t’races.’
a most beautiful sight, francis goodchild finds ‘t’races’ to be, when he has left fair doncaster behind him, and comes out on the free course, with its agreeable prospect, its quaint red house oddly changing and turning as francis turns, its green grass, and fresh heath. a free course and an easy one, where francis can roll smoothly where he will, and can choose between the start, or the coming-in, or the turn behind the brow of the hill, or any out-of-the-way point where he lists to see the throbbing horses straining every nerve, and making the sympathetic earth throb as they come by. francis much delights to be, not in the grand stand, but where he can see it, rising against the sky with its vast tiers of little white dots of faces, and its last high rows and corners of people, looking like pins stuck into an enormous pincushion—not quite so symmetrically as his orderly eye could wish, when people change or go away. when the race is nearly run out, it is as good as the race to him to see the flutter among the pins, and the change in them from dark to light, as hats are taken off and waved. not less full of interest, the loud anticipation of the winner’s name, the swelling, and the final, roar; then, the quick dropping of all the pins out of their places, the revelation of the shape of the bare pincushion, and the closing-in of the whole host of lunatics and keepers, in the rear of the three horses with bright-coloured riders, who have not yet quite subdued their gallop though the contest is over.
mr. goodchild would appear to have been by no means free from lunacy himself at ‘t’races,’ though not of the prevalent kind. he is suspected by mr. idle to have fallen into a dreadful state concerning a pair of little lilac gloves and a little bonnet that he saw there. mr. idle asserts, that he did afterwards repeat at the angel, with an appearance of being lunatically seized, some rhapsody to the following effect: ‘o little lilac gloves! and o winning little bonnet, making in conjunction with her golden hair quite a glory in the sunlight round the pretty head, why anything in the world but you and me! why may not this day’s running-of horses, to all the rest: of precious sands of life to me—be prolonged through an everlasting autumn-sunshine, without a sunset! slave of the lamp, or ring, strike me yonder gallant equestrian clerk of the course, in the scarlet coat, motionless on the green grass for ages! friendly devil on two sticks, for ten times ten thousands years, keep blink-bonny jibbing at the post, and let us have no start! arab drums, powerful of old to summon genii in the desert, sound of yourselves and raise a troop for me in the desert of my heart, which shall so enchant this dusty barouche (with a conspicuous excise-plate, resembling the collector’s door-plate at a turnpike), that i, within it, loving the little lilac gloves, the winning little bonnet, and the dear unknown-wearer with the golden hair, may wait by her side for ever, to see a great st. leger that shall never be run!’
thursday morning. after a tremendous night of crowding, shouting, drinking-house expectoration, gong-donkey, and correct cards. symptoms of yesterday’s gains in the way of drink, and of yesterday’s losses in the way of money, abundant. money-losses very great. as usual, nobody seems to have won; but, large losses and many losers are unquestionable facts. both lunatics and keepers, in general very low. several of both kinds look in at the chemist’s while mr. goodchild is making a purchase there, to be ‘picked up.’ one red-eyed lunatic, flushed, faded, and disordered, enters hurriedly and cries savagely, ‘hond us a gloss of sal volatile in wather, or soom dommed thing o’ thot sart!’ faces at the betting rooms very long, and a tendency to bite nails observable. keepers likewise given this morning to standing about solitary, with their hands in their pockets, looking down at their boots as they fit them into cracks of the pavement, and then looking up whistling and walking away. grand alliance circus out, in procession; buxom lady-member of grand alliance, in crimson riding-habit, fresher to look at, even in her paint under the day sky, than the cheeks of lunatics or keepers. spanish cavalier appears to have lost yesterday, and jingles his bossed bridle with disgust, as if he were paying. reaction also apparent at the guildhall opposite, whence certain pickpockets come out handcuffed together, with that peculiar walk which is never seen under any other circumstances—a walk expressive of going to jail, game, but still of jails being in bad taste and arbitrary, and how would you like it if it was you instead of me, as it ought to be! mid-day. town filled as yesterday, but not so full; and emptied as yesterday, but not so empty. in the evening, angel ordinary where every lunatic and keeper has his modest daily meal of turtle, venison, and wine, not so crowded as yesterday, and not so noisy. at night, the theatre. more abstracted faces in it than one ever sees at public assemblies; such faces wearing an expression which strongly reminds mr. goodchild of the boys at school who were ‘going up next,’ with their arithmetic or mathematics. these boys are, no doubt, going up to-morrow with their sums and figures. mr. palmer and mr. thurtell in the boxes o. p. mr. thurtell and mr. palmer in the boxes p. s. the firm of thurtell, palmer, and thurtell, in the boxes centre. a most odious tendency observable in these distinguished gentlemen to put vile constructions on sufficiently innocent phrases in the play, and then to applaud them in a satyr-like manner. behind mr. goodchild, with a party of other lunatics and one keeper, the express incarnation of the thing called a ‘gent.’ a gentleman born; a gent manufactured. a something with a scarf round its neck, and a slipshod speech issuing from behind the scarf; more depraved, more foolish, more ignorant, more unable to believe in any noble or good thing of any kind, than the stupidest bosjesman. the thing is but a boy in years, and is addled with drink. to do its company justice, even its company is ashamed of it, as it drawls its slang criticisms on the representation, and inflames mr. goodchild with a burning ardour to fling it into the pit. its remarks are so horrible, that mr. goodchild, for the moment, even doubts whether that is a wholesome art, which sets women apart on a high floor before such a thing as this, though as good as its own sisters, or its own mother—whom heaven forgive for bringing it into the world! but, the consideration that a low nature must make a low world of its own to live in, whatever the real materials, or it could no more exist than any of us could without the sense of touch, brings mr. goodchild to reason: the rather, because the thing soon drops its downy chin upon its scarf, and slobbers itself asleep.
friday morning. early fights. gong-donkey, and correct cards. again, a great set towards the races, though not so great a set as on wednesday. much packing going on too, upstairs at the gun-smith’s, the wax-chandler’s, and the serious stationer’s; for there will be a heavy drift of lunatics and keepers to london by the afternoon train. the course as pretty as ever; the great pincushion as like a pincushion, but not nearly so full of pins; whole rows of pins wanting. on the great event of the day, both lunatics and keepers become inspired with rage; and there is a violent scuffling, and a rushing at the losing jockey, and an emergence of the said jockey from a swaying and menacing crowd, protected by friends, and looking the worse for wear; which is a rough proceeding, though animating to see from a pleasant distance. after the great event, rills begin to flow from the pincushion towards the railroad; the rills swell into rivers; the rivers soon unite into a lake. the lake floats mr. goodchild into doncaster, past the itinerant personage in black, by the way-side telling him from the vantage ground of a legibly printed placard on a pole that for all these things the lord will bring him to judgment. no turtle and venison ordinary this evening; that is all over. no betting at the rooms; nothing there but the plants in pots, which have, all the week, been stood about the entry to give it an innocent appearance, and which have sorely sickened by this time.
saturday. mr. idle wishes to know at breakfast, what were those dreadful groanings in his bedroom doorway in the night? mr. goodchild answers, nightmare. mr. idle repels the calumny, and calls the waiter. the angel is very sorry—had intended to explain; but you see, gentlemen, there was a gentleman dined down-stairs with two more, and he had lost a deal of money, and he would drink a deal of wine, and in the night he ‘took the horrors,’ and got up; and as his friends could do nothing with him he laid himself down and groaned at mr. idle’s door. ‘and he did groan there,’ mr. idle says; ‘and you will please to imagine me inside, “taking the horrors” too!’
so far, the picture of doncaster on the occasion of its great sporting anniversary, offers probably a general representation of the social condition of the town, in the past as well as in the present time. the sole local phenomenon of the current year, which may be considered as entirely unprecedented in its way, and which certainly claims, on that account, some slight share of notice, consists in the actual existence of one remarkable individual, who is sojourning in doncaster, and who, neither directly nor indirectly, has anything at all to do, in any capacity whatever, with the racing amusements of the week. ranging throughout the entire crowd that fills the town, and including the inhabitants as well as the visitors, nobody is to be found altogether disconnected with the business of the day, excepting this one unparalleled man. he does not bet on the races, like the sporting men. he does not assist the races, like the jockeys, starters, judges, and grooms. he does not look on at the races, like mr. goodchild and his fellow-spectators. he does not profit by the races, like the hotel-keepers and the tradespeople. he does not minister to the necessities of the races, like the booth-keepers, the postilions, the waiters, and the hawkers of lists. he does not assist the attractions of the races, like the actors at the theatre, the riders at the circus, or the posturers at the poses plastiques. absolutely and literally, he is the only individual in doncaster who stands by the brink of the full-flowing race-stream, and is not swept away by it in common with all the rest of his species. who is this modern hermit, this recluse of the st. leger-week, this inscrutably ungregarious being, who lives apart from the amusements and activities of his fellow-creatures? surely, there is little difficulty in guessing that clearest and easiest of all riddles. who could he be, but mr. thomas idle?
thomas had suffered himself to be taken to doncaster, just as he would have suffered himself to be taken to any other place in the habitable globe which would guarantee him the temporary possession of a comfortable sofa to rest his ankle on. once established at the hotel, with his leg on one cushion and his back against another, he formally declined taking the slightest interest in any circumstance whatever connected with the races, or with the people who were assembled to see them. francis goodchild, anxious that the hours should pass by his crippled travelling-companion as lightly as possible, suggested that his sofa should be moved to the window, and that he should amuse himself by looking out at the moving panorama of humanity, which the view from it of the principal street presented. thomas, however, steadily declined profiting by the suggestion.
‘the farther i am from the window,’ he said, ‘the better, brother francis, i shall be pleased. i have nothing in common with the one prevalent idea of all those people who are passing in the street. why should i care to look at them?’
‘i hope i have nothing in common with the prevalent idea of a great many of them, either,’ answered goodchild, thinking of the sporting gentlemen whom he had met in the course of his wanderings about doncaster. ‘but, surely, among all the people who are walking by the house, at this very moment, you may find—’
‘not one living creature,’ interposed thomas, ‘who is not, in one way or another, interested in horses, and who is not, in a greater or less degree, an admirer of them. now, i hold opinions in reference to these particular members of the quadruped creation, which may lay claim (as i believe) to the disastrous distinction of being unpartaken by any other human being, civilised or savage, over the whole surface of the earth. taking the horse as an animal in the abstract, francis, i cordially despise him from every point of view.’
‘thomas,’ said goodchild, ‘confinement to the house has begun to affect your biliary secretions. i shall go to the chemist’s and get you some physic.’
‘i object,’ continued thomas, quietly possessing himself of his friend’s hat, which stood on a table near him,—‘i object, first, to the personal appearance of the horse. i protest against the conventional idea of beauty, as attached to that animal. i think his nose too long, his forehead too low, and his legs (except in the case of the cart-horse) ridiculously thin by comparison with the size of his body. again, considering how big an animal he is, i object to the contemptible delicacy of his constitution. is he not the sickliest creature in creation? does any child catch cold as easily as a horse? does he not sprain his fetlock, for all his appearance of superior strength, as easily as i sprained my ankle! furthermore, to take him from another point of view, what a helpless wretch he is! no fine lady requires more constant waiting-on than a horse. other animals can make their own toilette: he must have a groom. you will tell me that this is because we want to make his coat artificially glossy. glossy! come home with me, and see my cat,—my clever cat, who can groom herself! look at your own dog! see how the intelligent creature curry-combs himself with his own honest teeth! then, again, what a fool the horse is, what a poor, nervous fool! he will start at a piece of white paper in the road as if it was a lion. his one idea, when he hears a noise that he is not accustomed to, is to run away from it. what do you say to those two common instances of the sense and courage of this absurdly overpraised animal? i might multiply them to two hundred, if i chose to exert my mind and waste my breath, which i never do. i prefer coming at once to my last charge against the horse, which is the most serious of all, because it affects his moral character. i accuse him boldly, in his capacity of servant to man, of slyness and treachery. i brand him publicly, no matter how mild he may look about the eyes, or how sleek he may be about the coat, as a systematic betrayer, whenever he can get the chance, of the confidence reposed in him. what do you mean by laughing and shaking your head at me?’
‘oh, thomas, thomas!’ said goodchild. ‘you had better give me my hat; you had better let me get you that physic.’
‘i will let you get anything you like, including a composing draught for yourself,’ said thomas, irritably alluding to his fellow-apprentice’s inexhaustible activity, ‘if you will only sit quiet for five minutes longer, and hear me out. i say again the horse is a betrayer of the confidence reposed in him; and that opinion, let me add, is drawn from my own personal experience, and is not based on any fanciful theory whatever. you shall have two instances, two overwhelming instances. let me start the first of these by asking, what is the distinguishing quality which the shetland pony has arrogated to himself, and is still perpetually trumpeting through the world by means of popular report and books on natural history? i see the answer in your face: it is the quality of being sure-footed. he professes to have other virtues, such as hardiness and strength, which you may discover on trial; but the one thing which he insists on your believing, when you get on his back, is that he may be safely depended on not to tumble down with you. very good. some years ago, i was in shetland with a party of friends. they insisted on taking me with them to the top of a precipice that overhung the sea. it was a great distance off, but they all determined to walk to it except me. i was wiser then than i was with you at carrock, and i determined to be carried to the precipice. there was no carriage-road in the island, and nobody offered (in consequence, as i suppose, of the imperfectly-civilised state of the country) to bring me a sedan-chair, which is naturally what i should have liked best. a shetland pony was produced instead. i remembered my natural history, i recalled popular report, and i got on the little beast’s back, as any other man would have done in my position, placing implicit confidence in the sureness of his feet. and how did he repay that confidence? brother francis, carry your mind on from morning to noon. picture to yourself a howling wilderness of grass and bog, bounded by low stony hills. pick out one particular spot in that imaginary scene, and sketch me in it, with outstretched arms, curved back, and heels in the air, plunging headforemost into a black patch of water and mud. place just behind me the legs, the body, and the head of a sure-footed shetland pony, all stretched flat on the ground, and you will have produced an accurate representation of a very lamentable fact. and the moral device, francis, of this picture will be to testify that when gentlemen put confidence in the legs of shetland ponies, they will find to their cost that they are leaning on nothing but broken reeds. there is my first instance—and what have you got to say to that?’
‘nothing, but that i want my hat,’ answered goodchild, starting up and walking restlessly about the room.
‘you shall have it in a minute,’ rejoined thomas. ‘my second instance’—(goodchild groaned, and sat down again)—‘my second instance is more appropriate to the present time and place, for it refers to a race-horse. two years ago an excellent friend of mine, who was desirous of prevailing on me to take regular exercise, and who was well enough acquainted with the weakness of my legs to expect no very active compliance with his wishes on their part, offered to make me a present of one of his horses. hearing that the animal in question had started in life on the turf, i declined accepting the gift with many thanks; adding, by way of explanation, that i looked on a race-horse as a kind of embodied hurricane, upon which no sane man of my character and habits could be expected to seat himself. my friend replied that, however appropriate my metaphor might be as applied to race-horses in general, it was singularly unsuitable as applied to the particular horse which he proposed to give me. from a foal upwards this remarkable animal had been the idlest and most sluggish of his race. whatever capacities for speed he might possess he had kept so strictly to himself, that no amount of training had ever brought them out. he had been found hopelessly slow as a racer, and hopelessly lazy as a hunter, and was fit for nothing but a quiet, easy life of it with an old gentleman or an invalid. when i heard this account of the horse, i don’t mind confessing that my heart warmed to him. visions of thomas idle ambling serenely on the back of a steed as lazy as himself, presenting to a restless world the soothing and composite spectacle of a kind of sluggardly centaur, too peaceable in his habits to alarm anybody, swam attractively before my eyes. i went to look at the horse in the stable. nice fellow! he was fast asleep with a kitten on his back. i saw him taken out for an airing by the groom. if he had had trousers on his legs i should not have known them from my own, so deliberately were they lifted up, so gently were they put down, so slowly did they get over the ground. from that moment i gratefully accepted my friend’s offer. i went home; the horse followed me—by a slow train. oh, francis, how devoutly i believed in that horse i how carefully i looked after all his little comforts! i had never gone the length of hiring a man-servant to wait on myself; but i went to the expense of hiring one to wait upon him. if i thought a little of myself when i bought the softest saddle that could be had for money, i thought also of my horse. when the man at the shop afterwards offered me spurs and a whip, i turned from him with horror. when i sallied out for my first ride, i went purposely unarmed with the means of hurrying my steed. he proceeded at his own pace every step of the way; and when he stopped, at last, and blew out both his sides with a heavy sigh, and turned his sleepy head and looked behind him, i took him home again, as i might take home an artless child who said to me, “if you please, sir, i am tired.” for a week this complete harmony between me and my horse lasted undisturbed. at the end of that time, when he had made quite sure of my friendly confidence in his laziness, when he had thoroughly acquainted himself with all the little weaknesses of my seat (and their name is legion), the smouldering treachery and ingratitude of the equine nature blazed out in an instant. without the slightest provocation from me, with nothing passing him at the time but a pony-chaise driven by an old lady, he started in one instant from a state of sluggish depression to a state of frantic high spirits. he kicked, he plunged, he shied, he pranced, he capered fearfully. i sat on him as long as i could, and when i could sit no longer, i fell off. no, francis! this is not a circumstance to be laughed at, but to be wept over. what would be said of a man who had requited my kindness in that way? range over all the rest of the animal creation, and where will you find me an instance of treachery so black as this? the cow that kicks down the milking-pail may have some reason for it; she may think herself taxed too heavily to contribute to the dilution of human tea and the greasing of human bread. the tiger who springs out on me unawares has the excuse of being hungry at the time, to say nothing of the further justification of being a total stranger to me. the very flea who surprises me in my sleep may defend his act of assassination on the ground that i, in my turn, am always ready to murder him when i am awake. i defy the whole body of natural historians to move me, logically, off the ground that i have taken in regard to the horse. receive back your hat, brother francis, and go to the chemist’s, if you please; for i have now done. ask me to take anything you like, except an interest in the doncaster races. ask me to look at anything you like, except an assemblage of people all animated by feelings of a friendly and admiring nature towards the horse. you are a remarkably well-informed man, and you have heard of hermits. look upon me as a member of that ancient fraternity, and you will sensibly add to the many obligations which thomas idle is proud to owe to francis goodchild.’
here, fatigued by the effort of excessive talking, disputatious thomas waved one hand languidly, laid his head back on the sofa-pillow, and calmly closed his eyes.
at a later period, mr. goodchild assailed his travelling companion boldly from the impregnable fortress of common sense. but thomas, though tamed in body by drastic discipline, was still as mentally unapproachable as ever on the subject of his favourite delusion.
the view from the window after saturday’s breakfast is altogether changed. the tradesmen’s families have all come back again. the serious stationer’s young woman of all work is shaking a duster out of the window of the combination breakfast-room; a child is playing with a doll, where mr. thurtell’s hair was brushed; a sanitary scrubbing is in progress on the spot where mr. palmer’s braces were put on. no signs of the races are in the streets, but the tramps and the tumble-down-carts and trucks laden with drinking-forms and tables and remnants of booths, that are making their way out of the town as fast as they can. the angel, which has been cleared for action all the week, already begins restoring every neat and comfortable article of furniture to its own neat and comfortable place. the angel’s daughters (pleasanter angels mr. idle and mr. goodchild never saw, nor more quietly expert in their business, nor more superior to the common vice of being above it), have a little time to rest, and to air their cheerful faces among the flowers in the yard. it is market-day. the market looks unusually natural, comfortable, and wholesome; the market-people too. the town seems quite restored, when, hark! a metallic bray—the gong-donkey!
the wretched animal has not cleared off with the rest, but is here, under the window. how much more inconceivably drunk now, how much more begrimed of paw, how much more tight of calico hide, how much more stained and daubed and dirty and dunghilly, from his horrible broom to his tender toes, who shall say! he cannot even shake the bray out of himself now, without laying his cheek so near to the mud of the street, that he pitches over after delivering it. now, prone in the mud, and now backing himself up against shop-windows, the owners of which come out in terror to remove him; now, in the drinking-shop, and now in the tobacconist’s, where he goes to buy tobacco, and makes his way into the parlour, and where he gets a cigar, which in half-a-minute he forgets to smoke; now dancing, now dozing, now cursing, and now complimenting my lord, the colonel, the noble captain, and your honourable worship, the gong-donkey kicks up his heels, occasionally braying, until suddenly, he beholds the dearest friend he has in the world coming down the street.
the dearest friend the gong-donkey has in the world, is a sort of jackall, in a dull, mangy, black hide, of such small pieces that it looks as if it were made of blacking bottles turned inside out and cobbled together. the dearest friend in the world (inconceivably drunk too) advances at the gong-donkey, with a hand on each thigh, in a series of humorous springs and stops, wagging his head as he comes. the gong-donkey regarding him with attention and with the warmest affection, suddenly perceives that he is the greatest enemy he has in the world, and hits him hard in the countenance. the astonished jackall closes with the donkey, and they roll over and over in the mud, pummelling one another. a police inspector, supernaturally endowed with patience, who has long been looking on from the guildhall-steps, says, to a myrmidon, ‘lock ’em up! bring ’em in!’
appropriate finish to the grand race-week. the gong-donkey, captive and last trace of it, conveyed into limbo, where they cannot do better than keep him until next race-week. the jackall is wanted too, and is much looked for, over the way and up and down. but, having had the good fortune to be undermost at the time of the capture, he has vanished into air.
on saturday afternoon, mr. goodchild walks out and looks at the course. it is quite deserted; heaps of broken crockery and bottles are raised to its memory; and correct cards and other fragments of paper are blowing about it, as the regulation little paper-books, carried by the french soldiers in their breasts, were seen, soon after the battle was fought, blowing idly about the plains of waterloo.
where will these present idle leaves be blown by the idle winds, and where will the last of them be one day lost and forgotten? an idle question, and an idle thought.; and with it mr. idle fitly makes his bow, and mr. goodchild his, and thus ends the lazy tour of two idle apprentices.
