Читать книгу Vivian Grey - Benjamin Disraeli - Страница 33

What is this chapter to be about? Come, I am inclined to be courteous! You shall choose the subject of it. What shall it be, sentiment or scandal? a love-scene or a lay sermon? You will not choose? Then we must open the note which Vivian, in the morning, found on his pillow:—

“Did you hear the horrid shriek last night? It must have disturbed every one. I think it must have been one of the South American birds which Captain Tropic gave the Marchioness. Do not they sometimes favour the world with these nocturnal shriekings? Is not there a passage in Spix apropos to this? A–.”

“Did you hear the shriek last night, Mr. Grey?” asked the Marchioness, as Vivian entered the breakfast-room.

“Oh, yes! Mr. Grey, did you hear the shriek?” asked Miss Graves.

“Who did not?”

“What could it be?” said the Marchioness.

“What could it be?” said Miss Graves.

“What should it be; a cat in a gutter, or a sick cow, or a toad dying to be devoured, Miss Graves?”

Always snub toadeys and led captains. It is only your greenhorns who endeavour to make their way by fawning and cringing to every member of the establishment. It is a miserable mistake. No one likes his dependants to be treated with respect, for such treatment affords an unpleasant contrast to his own conduct. Besides, it makes the toadey’s blood unruly. There are three persons, mind you, to be attended to: my lord, or my lady, as the case may be (usually the latter), the pet daughter, and the pet dog. I throw out these hints en passant, for my principal objects in writing this work are to amuse myself and to instruct society. In some future hook, probably the twentieth or twenty-fifth, when the plot logins to wear threadbare, and we can afford a digression. I may give a chapter on Domestic Tactics.

“My dear Marchioness,” continued Vivian, “see there: I have kept my promise, there is your bracelet. How is Julie to-day?”

“Poor dear, I hope she is better.”

“Oh! yes, poor Julie. I think she is better.”

“I do not know that, Miss Graves,” said her Ladyship, somewhat tartly, not at all approving of a toadey thinking. “I am afraid that scream last night must have disturbed her. O dear, Mr. Grey, I am afraid she will be ill again.”

Miss Graves looked mournful, and lifted up her eyes and hands to Heaven, but did not dare to speak this time.

“I thought she looked a little heavy about the eyes this morning,” said the Marchioness, apparently very agitated; “and I have heard from Eglamour this post; he is not well, too; I think everybody is ill now; he has caught a fever going to see the ruins of Paestum. I wonder why people go to see ruins!”

“I wonder, indeed,” said Miss Graves; “I never could see anything in a ruin.”

“O, Mr. Grey!” continued the Marchioness, “I really am afraid Julie is going to be very ill.”

“Let Miss Graves pull her tail and give her a little mustard seed: she will be better tomorrow.”

“Remember that, Miss Graves.”

“Oh! y-e-s, my Lady!”

“Mrs. Felix,” said the Marchioness, as that lady entered the room, “you are late to-day; I always reckon upon you as a supporter of an early breakfast at Desir.”

“I have been half round the park.”

“Did you hear the scream, Mrs. Felix?”

“Do you know what it was, Marchioness?”

“No: do you?”

“See the reward of early rising and a walk before breakfast. It was one of your new American birds, and it has half torn down your aviary.”

“One of the new Americans? O the naughty thing; and has it broken the new fancy wirework?”

Here a little odd-looking, snuffy old man, with a brown scratch wig, who had been very busily employed the whole breakfast-time with a cold game pie, the bones of which Vivian observed him most scientifically pick and polish, laid down his knife and fork, and addressed the Marchioness with an air of great interest.

“Pray, will your Ladyship have the goodness to inform me what bird this is?”

The Marchioness looked astounded at any one presuming to ask her a question; and then she drawled, “Mr. Grey, you know everything; tell this gentleman what some bird is.”

Now this gentleman was Mr. Mackaw, the most celebrated ornithologist extant, and who had written a treatise on Brazilian parroquets, in three volumes folio. He had arrived late at the Château the preceding night, and, although he had the honour of presenting his letter of introduction to the Marquess, this morning was the first time he had been seen by any of the party present, who were of course profoundly ignorant of his character.

“Oh! we were talking of some South American bird given to the Marchioness by the famous Captain Tropic; you know him, perhaps; Bolivar’s brother-in-law, or aide-de-camp, or something of that kind; and which screams so dreadfully at night that the whole family is disturbed. The Chowchowtow it is called; is not it, Mrs. Lorraine?”

“The Chowchowtow!” said Mr. Mackaw; “I don’t know it by that name.”

“Do not you? I dare say we shall find an account of it in Spix, however,” said Vivian, rising, and taking a volume from the book-case; “ay! here it is; I will read it to you.”

“‘The Chowchowtow is about five feet seven inches in height from the point of the bill to the extremity of the claws. Its plumage is of a dingy, yellowish white; its form is elegant, and in its movements and action a certain pleasing and graceful dignity is observable; but its head is by no means worthy of the rest of its frame; and the expression of its eye is indicative of the cunning and treachery of its character. The habits of this bird are peculiar: occasionally most easily domesticated, it is apparently sensible of the slightest kindness; but its regard cannot be depended upon, and for the slightest inducement, or with the least irritation, it will fly at its feeder. At other times it seeks perfect solitude, and can only be captured with the utmost skill and perseverance. It generally feeds three times a day, but its appetite is not rapacious; it sleeps little, is usually on the wing at sunrise, and proves that it slumbers but little in the night by its nocturnal and thrilling shrieks.’”

“What an extraordinary bird! Is that the bird you meant, Mrs. Felix Lorraine?”

Mr. Mackaw was restless the whole time that Vivian was reading this interesting passage. At last he burst forth with an immense deal of science and a great want of construction, a want which scientific men often experience, always excepting those mealy-mouthed professors who lecture “at the Royal,” and get patronised by the blues, the Lavoisiers of May Fair!

“Chowchowtow, my Lady! five feet seven inches high! Brazilian bird! When I just remind your Ladyship that the height of the tallest bird to be found in Brazil, and in mentioning this fact, I mention nothing hypothetical, the tallest bird does not stand higher than four feet nine. Chowchowtow! Dr. Spix is a name, accurate traveller, don’t remember the passage, most singular bird! Chowchowtow! don’t know it by that name. Perhaps your Ladyship is not aware; I think you called that gentleman Mr. Grey; perhaps Mr. Grey is not aware, that I am Mr. Mackaw, I arrived late here last night, whose work in three volumes folio, on Brazilian Parroquets, although I had the honour of seeing his Lordship is, I trust, a sufficient evidence that I am not speaking at random on this subject; and consequently, from the lateness of the hour, could not have the honour of being introduced to your Ladyship.”