The Remarkable History of Sir Thomas Upmore, bart., M.P., formerly known as «Tommy Upmore»

Meanwhile she was begging me not to be afraid, herself having now overcome all fear; and she signed to the boatmen (who had fallen back, with their frank faces wrinkled, as a puzzle is) that they might come forward, and be kind to me. It was not in their power to do this, because they had not yet finished staring; therefore she offered me her own white hand, and I wished that I had washed mine lately.

"These are my children," she said, as I followed her down the planks, without a word; "it was Laura, who saw you first up in the air, and Roly who ordered the men to row over, when that wicked young man put his gun up. We thought it was some new kind of bird. And so you are – a boy bird! Roly, and Laura, let me introduce you to this young gentleman. There is nothing about him to be afraid of, although he has come down from the clouds, or rather from the clear sky, this beautiful evening. He declares that he can be scientifically explained; and when that can be done, there is nothing more to say. Roly has never known what fear is, ever since he cut his teeth."

From all I have seen of this gentleman since then – and I have seen a great deal of him for twenty years, and never can see too much of him – I can fully confirm what his dear mother said. Just then, he was a boy of about my age, or a year or two older he might be; but pounds, and tens, and twenty pounds, heavier, and an inch or two taller, and many shades darker. I was as fair in complexion, before a great mob of troubles came darkening me, as if I had sprung from a boiling of Pontic wax, besprinkled with roses of Cashmere. But Roly (or to give him his full deserts, Sir Roland Towers-Twentifold) was a dark, and thoughtful, and determined lad, who meant to make his mark upon our history, and is doing it.

He came up, and took my hand, as if he would squeeze any cloudiness out of me; and nothing but the pinches I had often had at school, enabled me to bear it without a squeak. He had been at the helm, as they call it, to direct the boat the right way to catch me; and although he was greatly surprised, he concluded – as all Englishmen do upon such occasions – that the time to explain things would ensue, after they had been dealt with.

CHAPTER X.
THE NEW ADMIRAL

To me, who am accustomed to myself, it has always seemed much more wonderful, that my father should deny my peculiar powers, than that I should possess them. "Go up, Tommy," he has said a thousand times; "don't be so shy about it, but up with you! The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Only fly up to the bedroom window sill, as that little sparrow from the road has done, and I'll own that I'm a fool, and you a wonder. But, until you have done it, in my sight, my son, I shall stick to my old experience, that all the human race are liars, but not one of them a flyer."

His strong opinion proved itself, as the manner of strong opinions is; and instead of being able to arise, while he was waiting, with his hands in his pockets, and a pipe in his mouth, I was more inclined to go into the ground, whenever it happened to be soft.

And so, even now, (when some fifty people had seen me in the air, and were ready to make oath to a great deal more than I had done) father stuck to it, that they all were liars, or fools, or crazy, or else tipsy at the least. But he scarcely knew what to say at first, when just as he was going to sit down to dinner, a mighty great noise arose under the window, of sailors hurraing, and the brass-band roaring, and Grip as loud as any of them, barking at his utmost.

"D – n it," said my father to my mother; "is this the quiet place John Windsor spoke of? When a man can't even sit down to his dinner – "

"Dinner indeed! Don't think twice of your dinner;" cried mother from the window, in great excitement, "here is a thing that you never saw before, and will never see again, if you live to be a hundred. Our Tommy in a flag, and all the sailors in the kingdom, taking off their hats, and cheering him, and the dear little poppet as modest as ever, exactly like an Angel! And a beautiful lady, you can see by the look that all the place belongs to her – you can tell at a glance who she is, of course – Bucephalus, how slow you are!"

"Slow, for not knowing at a glance a female, I never saw or heard of, in all my life! And in a strange place I was never in before! How should I know her from Adam – or at least, Eve?"

"Bucephalus! Why, of course she must be Lady Towers-Twentifold, widow of the late, and sincerely lamented, Sir Robert Towers-Twentifold, who died, after tortures surpassing description, from swallowing his own corundum tooth. Every stick, and stone, for ten miles in every direction belongs to him, and he leaves a lovely widow, and an only son, the present Sir Roland Towers-Twentifold, scarcely any older than our Tommy, and an only daughter Laura. Bless me, how true everything is coming! I can believe every word of it, now I see them."

"Including the man with the corundum tooth. In the name of Moses, Sophy, how the deuce have you found out all this already?"

"I have found out nothing; and I am surprised at your low way of putting it, Bucephalus. When I met the chambermaid, could I do less than pass the time of day to her? But look, they have carried our Tommy three times, with the 'Conquering Hero comes' twice and a half, round the – I forget what dear Jane Windsor says is the right foreign name for it – and I think, Mr. Upmore, the least we can do, is to throw up the window, and bow our acknowledgments gracefully, as the papers say."

"I'm blowed if I'll do anything of the sort. Half a crown's worth of coppers would be gone in no time. Keep behind the curtain, Sophy; or back we all go to business to-morrow morning; and I heartily wish we had never come away. At home, when I am hungry, I can get my dinner."

"Oh dear, he has spoiled his white ducks with tar, and Grip is in a dreadful mess of wet, and the sailors want to hoist him too, if he would only let them! I see what it is – how stupid of me! Tommy has been flying all over the sea, and Grip has been swimming after him! Oh, Bucephalus, how can you eat your dinner? Is this a proper time, for you to be devouring dinner?"

"You are right enough there, Sophy;" answered father, "I ought to have had it five hours ago. I call it tempting Providence with one's constitution, to go so long after breakfast-time. I only hope, the zanies won't come wanting to hoist me."

Alas, that the stronger of my parents should have shown such incredulity! Did it follow that, inasmuch as he was heavy, all his productions must draw the beam? If so, dead must drop all the wit of Falstaff, and all the sweet humour of Thackeray. And how could my father have made light sperm, or the soap, that he labelled "the froth of the sea"? Such questions, however, come dangerously near to science, and its vast analogies. Enough, that my father paid dear in the end, for all this incredulity; as will be made manifest, further on; and sorry shall I be to tell it.

My dear mother was already of opinion, that it was a crime upon any one's part, even to attempt to explain my achievements, and downright treason to deny them. When the beautiful Lady Twentifold – as people called her for convenience, though her proper name was Towers-Twentifold– came, when the public was tired of shouting, to learn all that could with propriety be learned, of the origin of her "great little wonder," few people verily would believe what my mother was fanciful enough to do. The lady (to whom the hotel belonged, and all the people there, in my opinion) sat down in the parlour downstairs, with my hand in hers – for she had taken dear liking to me, because I resembled a child she had lost – and she begged the landlady to go to my mother, without any card or formality, and ask whether she might have the pleasure of seeing, and telling her about her boy.

It is a very clumsy thing for me to find fault with the behaviour of my parents, and I am not prepared to do so now. There may have been fifty reasons, clear to people much wiser than myself; but certainly I was amazed, and angry, when Mrs. Roaker came back to say, that the lady from London was so fatigued, with the dreadful effects of her journey, that she begged to thank her ladyship most warmly, for very great kindness to her dear son; but felt quite unequal to an interview with her.

"How many of you are there, Tommy?" Lady Twentifold asked, without my knowing why. But she always went straight to the meaning of things.

"Only me, ma'am, if you please;" I answered, looking up, in fear that there ought to have been more; "but I did hear a woman say, that there had been another; but he went to heaven, before me, I believe."

The lady looked at me, with her eyes quite soft, which they had not been, when she received that message; and she seemed to be uncertain, whether she was right, in putting her next question.

"Has your father been married more than once, my dear? I mean, is this lady your own dear mother, or become your mamma, since you can remember?"

I told her, that I could not remember any one thing about it, though I often thought. But this was my mother, Mrs. Upmore; everybody said so; and more than that, there was nobody else in all the world, who made a quarter so much of me.

"Tommy, I am quite satisfied upon that point," she answered; "there may be some reason, which I do not know of. Or perhaps your dear mother is not at all strong. Give her my compliments, and say that I hope she will be better soon, and the Happystowe air relieve her weakness. Now shake hands with Roly, and little Laura; and good-bye till we see you again, flying Tommy."

I had told her that my name was "flying Tommy;" and she was much pleased to hear it, because it showed, that the Happystowe air was not to blame, for my adventure. Then Sir Roland came up, and took my hand, and said that he hoped I would take him for a fly; and then, the most beautiful child I had ever set eyes on, stole up shyly, and put her little hand in mine, and left me to say good-bye to her.

On the following day, I felt as heavy as Grip (who weighed half a pound for every ounce that a human being of his size would weigh), and my father and my mother agreed, from different points of view, about me, – that I must be kept indoors, and fed, and put at my books, to steady me. We had brought some Greek in the bottom of a box, which father considered great nonsense, though it might be very good for children. And he told me to find out the Greek for soap, and spermaceti, and steam-engine, and write them down, so that he could read them; which I entirely failed to do. Meanwhile he set off, with his Admiral's coat, to inspect the sea and the shipping, and Mr. Barlow's boiling premises.

The day after that again was Sunday, when the rule of our house, and of most houses in Maiden Lane, was to lie in bed until nine o'clock, and have breakfast at ten, and attend to the dinner till dinner-time, and saunter in the fields towards Highgate, if the weather was fine in the afternoon, and to go to church, or chapel, sometimes, if there was nothing else to do in the evening; and then have a good supper, and be off to bed. But now mother said, and my father was quite unable to gainsay it, that, being in a country place like this, where everything depends upon example, with my father acknowledged to be an Admiral – not only because of his coat, and occasional d – ns, and general demeanour, but also because he had shaken his head, when requested to look at a ship through a spy-glass for twopence, and told the ancient tar that he had seen a deal too much of that – moreover with Tommy adored by all the aristocracy of the neighbourhood, and by the brave sailors, and people of less refinement, accepted as an angel, the least we could do was to make an effort, and try to be at church by eleven o'clock.

My father replied, that as concerned himself there need be no difficulty whatever, because as soon as he had done his breakfast, his only preparation was to smoke a pipe; but he did not believe that it was possible for mother, (who had spent all Saturday in the village-shops, because she had come in such hurry from home, that she had brought nothing fit to be seen in) to have all her toggery spick-and-span, and her hair done up to the nines, so early. But, if only to show him how little he knew, my mother was ready before he was; and father declared that she ruined his sleep, having got up to see the sun rise upon the sea, and stopped up to see herself grow brighter, and brighter, in the looking-glass. Dear mother had a great mind not to go to church, with such a wicked story ringing in her ears; until father told her that she looked stunning, and was fit to be put on a transparent lid – the lid of a box of transparent soap.

"Dear Bucephalus, now you see," she said, as she placed her primrose glove, on the sleeve of his blue coat with brass buttons, "one little portion perhaps of the reason, which led me to decline an interview, that night, with Lady Towers-Twentifold. My main reason was, of course, that I knew so thoroughly well what ladies are. If I had allowed her to see me, and satisfy all her great curiosity, about this wonderful darling of a Tommy, the chances are ten to one, that her ladyship would never have invited him to Twentifold Towers. But now, I intend that he shall go there; and what will the Windsors say to that?"

"Well, that was a very fine reason, Sophy. But I don't see the other, that I ought to see."

"Then Tommy is sharper than you, ten times. But walk a little better, if you please, my dear. Who can take you for an Admiral, if you drag your feet like that?"

From a joke, Mr. Windsor's idea had grown into a great and solid fact. Mrs. Roaker, and most of the Happystowe people, had made up their minds by this time, that my father was "Admiral Upmore." He was too honest, and plain a man, to encourage this mistake for a moment, and, whenever he got the chance, declared most stoutly, that he was no Admiral. The public, however, would not believe him, having met with some indications in commercial dealings with him, that he prized the royal effigy; from which it was clear, what his motive was in desiring to disguise his rank. And the Boots of the Twentifold Arms could swear that he saw Admiral printed, on the back of the label of a hairy trunk, which had only B. U. on the front of it. And so he did, to a certain extent; for mother had taken an advertising card beginning with Admirable, and cut it across, and put father's initials on the other side.

"They may call me what they like," my father said, when tired of contradiction, "so long as they don't charge me for it. Admiral Upmore serves my turn, uncommonly well, for two things. Billy Barlow would lock his gate, if he knew that I am only Boiler Upmore; and I am finding out some fine things there. And again, if any lawyer comes sneaking after my heels, with that chummy's process, he'll find his mistake in the visitor's list. But, Tommy, you'll catch it, if you let out a word of this in Maiden Lane. Why, I never should hear the last of it!"

And so the whole three of us went to church; and the sailors sitting on the tombstones – most of which were like chests of drawers, but without any handles to the names below – touched their hats to the Admiral's lady, and the gallant Admiral himself, and the smart little chap, who had been for a fly, like the cherub aloft, who smiles luck to poor Jack. It was one of dear mother's proudest moments – for the men at our works would never touch their hats, unless they had been tipped a shilling quite lately – and she bowed with her feathers (which had been a cock's) throwing off quite a flash, and a rustle; until she was compelled to look very grave, by the remark of an ancient tar, that he had never seen so fine a woman.

But alas, how fate does ring her changes with articulate-speaking mortals – the triumph of the chime, the hesitation of the back-stroke, and the toll of disappointment! Ere ever the bells in the tower had ceased, and the organ taken up the tale, dear mother was a pensive-hearted female, and her feathers out of plume. For in coming up the aisle, she had whispered to the buxom pew-opener; "Lady Towers-Twentifold has been seeking to make my acquaintance. Can we sit anywhere near her pew?"

"Certainly, ma'am;" said Mrs. Button, turning the handle of a large enclosure; "the Admiral, and yourself, can have her ladyship's pew, this morning, and this evening too, if you come again. Her ladyship has fifteen pews, in the fifteen parishes she owns, and she takes them all in turn; and it won't be our turn, for ten Sundays yet."

CHAPTER XI.
LARGE IDEAS

Perhaps it was lucky for me, that my mother had failed to amaze Lady Twentifold, with the elegance of her apparel. But after having taken all that trouble, and lost all her comfort of the morning, she felt it no less than a personal slight, that her ladyship should have disgraced herself so, by neglecting divine worship.

"But she went to some other church," said father.

"I don't believe a word of it," answered mother, with both hands on her prayer-book; "she spent her whole morning in bed, no doubt. I never could endure those slothful ways; and the less we have to do with such people, the better."

"Why, who ever dreamed of our having anything to do with them?" My father was astonished at any new idea always. "Sophy, I won't have this rubbish any more. I came down here, to enjoy myself, and live well, and improve my liver; as well as to bilk the vile harpies of the law, and find out Billy Barlow's tricks. But if I'm to put out my pipe, and smoke wet rolls (like Tom's taffy-sucks), and never be seen in my shirt-sleeves, and never get a smell of hot meat, till the bats are about, and be cut short of my d – ns indoors, and backed up in them out of doors, – why the world will have come to such a stuck-up pitch, as would soon turn me into a Radical."

My mother said less, but pondered more. In bygone days, she had seemed content with the place in which she found herself, proud of the works, and the sample-boxes, and our renown for quality; and insisting upon it, that we should be styled in all transactions "Upmore & Co." But lately, or indeed for a long time now, her mind had been taking an elevated tone, which lowered the quality of our victuals. She talked a great deal more of honour, and much less of honesty; she began to look down upon the Sunday papers; and she would not let her friends say "Ma'am" to her. My father declared, that this disease began with my going to the Partheneion, and was made much worse by Mrs. Windsor, and the four professors, and was now turned into a pestilence, by these bathing-machines, and the sailors at the church, and the brass-horn rogues coming round with the cap, and "my lady, if you please," upon the sands.

This "growth of refinement" as dear mother called it, – "spread of humbug" was my father's name for it – turned her attention, quite suddenly, to what she called my associations. The habit of my body, and mind, had been that of London boyhood in general, – to rush into anything going on, without waiting for an introduction, to give my opinion without invitation upon any public spectacle, or even a proceeding intended to be private until I came round the corner, and upon every occasion to ignore humanity's false exclusiveness. But on Monday morning, when we sat down to look at the people bathing – which my father, from some old-fashioned feeling, would never stop to do, but kept his distance, – mother began to give me a lesson, concerning the duties of society.

"Tommy," she said, "did you remark that the little boys go into one machine, and the little girls into the other? And they are not allowed, by the Board of Health, to be less than fifty yards apart."

"Yes, mother," I replied, "I was looking at that; and it seems to be the order on the board. But somehow they seem to contrive, in spite of it, to get all together in the water. And the girls – if I can make out which they are – seem to go all the way over to the boys! The board says that they will be prosecuted, with the extreme rigour of the law. There goes another girl, I declare!"

"Hush, Tommy, hush! Or society will expel us, like a pair of Pariahs. What I want you to notice, for your own good, is that high society has rules quite different from what the children in the street have. You, unluckily, have been permitted, while your father was in a smaller way of business, to associate with almost any boy of respectable trousers, in the roadway. I admit that I have not been as strict as I should be, partly because it was no good. But now it is high time to draw the line. You see how they put a cord along down there? Now what do you suppose they do it for?"

"I am sure I don't know, mother; unless it is, for people to tumble over it."

"No, Tommy, no. It is to keep the people out. The inferior classes must not come interfering with those who can pay for all the room they want. Your father is a Tory; but I begin to think, that I shall be a Radical; because I find them make people pay more, for getting into anything. A ticket for a week, for both of us, to see the people bathe, and dress their hair, and everything, was only half a crown for me, and fifteenpence for you, my dear! And you may sit, all the time, on the ground of the earth, which is so much cleaner than the seats they make. Come into this hole, with the rushes on the top – where I dare say some wild animal has lived – and never mind the people in the waves, my dear. What I want you to be, is a great man, Tommy; a very great man, who may look down upon the little ones, and remember (when he has lost his own dear mother) that he owes all his greatness to her counsel, and high principles."

My dear mother spoke with such depth of feeling – especially in reference to her own end – that I had not the least idea what to say, and did not like to cry, until I had waited for some more.

"School-life is hardening you, my son;" she said. "I have known the day, when you would have been crying long ago, at the description of all that I go through. However, it is all for the best, and my own doing. I must expect you to grow up. And grown-up men must never cry. Tommy, you can have two bull's-eyes, out of my pocket, if you know where to find them, while I am wiping my poor eyes. They were under my handkerchief right side down, and the old pair of gloves on the top of them, that I put on when the promenade is over. You have got them, my son? Well, take one at a time, and don't bite them, until I have said a few words. Don't be afraid, Tommy. I am not going to deliver a lecture, such as nobody ever that knows me could expect of me. You will have a great mind, my dear, as well as five talents of the body that will come to five and twenty, when the woman begins to sweep the house. And with all these great blessings of the Lord upon you, your first duty is to keep them all to yourself. That was one reason, why I would not come out, when they made such a fuss about you, the other night. They had no right to come between you and me; and heartily thankful as I felt to them, is it likely that I would put up with that sort of thing?"

"But, mother," I could not help saying, "suppose there had been nobody there, when I came down? You were out of sight altogether; and though I might not have gone down through the water, if my legs had gone in, they would have stuck there."

"Don't talk of such dreadful things, my dear. I am speaking sincerely out of gratitude. No one has ever accused your poor mother of any deficiency in that. But I think, that the least Lady Twentifold could do, was to come to church on Sunday, if only to thank the Lord for the service she had been enabled to render you. Few ladies have had such a chance afforded them; but she thinks much more of her fifteen pews. Now, Tommy, if you meet her on the beach, or any of the members of her family, you are not to rush up to them, as if you were under a great obligation, and make them talk large. You may show yourself; but wait for them to accost you, as Mrs. Windsor says. You know what to accost a person means."

"Yes, mother, from costa, the Latin for a rib. And it often comes in Homer. 'And thus accosting him in reply spake sovereign Agamemnon.' Old Rum does it like that, nearly always."

"Tommy, what a clever boy you are! I love to hear a bit of Latin from you. But whatever you say to the Twentifold people, you never must speak of your master as 'Old Rum.' It sounds quite low, and it contains no learning. You may speak of Dr. Rumbelow, if you like, and your place of education, the Pantheon– though why it should have the same name as a bazaar, I am very much afraid I shall never understand. But mind, more than anything else, my son, what I am going to tell you now. You say that none of them asked you, on Friday, what was your father's path in life."

"No, mother; none of them said a word about it. All they wanted to know was about myself. But I'm not sure, I did not tell about Old Rum."

"Well, it won't matter much, if you did, my dear. But the boys at school call you 'soap,' and 'tallow,' and 'bubbles,' and 'dips,' and a quantity of things; all of which prove how low they are themselves. Now, we will not allow these great people to do that. And the only way to stop them, is not to let them know private matters, that can be no concern of theirs. Above all things, be truthful as the day, my son. Your father is not an Admiral; and you must acknowledge that he is not – supposing that the question should come up – and if they want to know any more about him, which people of any good manners would not, just tell them (in so many words) the truth – that your father is a gentleman, the head of his own firm of merchants in the Metropolis, and invited to dine at the Mansion-house, from his eminence in politics."

"But suppose they should ask about the boiling, mother; and the things that we sell, and the smell in the Lane – "

"What a stupe you are! As if you didn't know by this time, after all the schooling you have had, that in good society nobody knows of anything that doesn't smell nice. The highest of them do all that themselves; but as for talking of it, and in the presence of ladies – why it makes them faint. Your mother is of a good family, Tommy; and you get your distinguished appearance from her. And though I did marry a Lightbody first, and after his time an Upmore, I have often been told that my ancestors had a knighthood in their family, which makes it improper for a son of mine, to say anything about soap-boiling. Moreover, I will tell you, as a very great secret, which you must not say a word about in Maiden Lane, what your father was saying in his sleep, the other night. It was the first night we came down here, and the strange bed, and the kicking noise the sea makes, and the late dinner, and the Welsh rabbit to top up with, perhaps interfered with his natural rest; for he has not told a word of his dreams for years. He thought he was talking to you, my dear, and you were at the top of a ladder, or a tree, so far as I could make out his words. 'Tommy, come down,' he said; 'come down, Tommy; and I'll show you where all the money is put, for you to go into Parliament.' And then I suppose that you wouldn't come down, for he slapped at his leg, where he keeps his money; and he called out louder – 'They meddle with me! I'll meddle with them, when it comes to a plum; and let them know who Upmore is. And if I am too old, my son shall do it.' And then he got sore, where he knocked himself; for his hand is heavy, and his veins are large; and he awoke very grumpy, and rubbed his leg; and I could not get any more out of him."

"Why, Bill Chumps is going into Parliament!" I cried, being struck by this strange coincidence; "and I should like to go very much, wherever he is; and Roly Twentifold is sure to go too; and we ought to do something between us, mother, for the good of the country, and all the poor people, and to make things fetch more money. I was reading about a great man, the other day – "

"I don't want to hear about any great men, until you are one of them, Tommy. Go and play on the sands, while I rest for an hour; this air does make me yawn so. Are you sure you have got your dumbbells in your pockets, and your fisherman's lead round the top of your stomach? Then whistle for Grip, for there might be Professors down here, for aught we know of. And come back, as soon as the London papers are down, if there is anything about any of us."

In spite of the weight I had now to carry, for fear of going out to sea again, I ran away joyfully down the sands, as they call the gravel where the sand should be. At the ring of the steel-whistle which I carried round my neck, Grip came bounding from the Inn to meet me, and with mutual confidence we began to poke about, for something to afford a hunt. Then I heard a voice holloaing out, "Hi, Tommy!" and with a long stride, quite like that of a man, Sir Roland Twentifold came down to me.

"Why, I thought you had given us the slip," he shouted, for he always spoke as if he wanted every one to hear; "I came down with my pony on Saturday, but I could not see a sign of you. And I did not like to call at the Inn, because of your mother's bad health, you know. And on Sundays, my mother won't let me go far; because she is religious, and so am I. There are so few fellows who care for that now, that I stick up for it, and mean to do so. I won't have everything turned upside down."

"Take care that my Grip doesn't roll you over," I exclaimed, for the dog had no muzzle on; "I can't always hold him, when he takes a dislike."

"Grip, come here," he said, "and talk to me. I have got a dozen dogs, who could eat you, Grip. But if you are good, they shall be good to you."

I could not help laughing at this idea, for Grip could thrash any three dogs I knew. But to my astonishment, Grip came up, and wagged his tail softly to Sir Roland, and sniffed about him pleasantly, and then offered his grisly ears for a loving rub.