night!'
Seeing that he lowered his weapon, and that he would not thrust
in turn, Sir John lowered his.
'Not to-night!' his adversary cried. 'Be warned in time!'
'You told me ā it must have been in a sort of inspiration ā ' said
Sir John, quite deliberately, though now he dropped his mask, and
showed his hatred in his face, 'that this was the last time. Be as-
sured it is! Did you beheve our last meeting was forgotten? Did
you believe that your every word and look was not to be accounted
for, and w^as not well remembered? Do you believe that I have
waited your time, or you mine? What kind of a man is he who
entered, with all his sickening cant of honesty and truth, into a
bond with me to prevent a marriage he affected to dislike, and
when I had redeemed my part to the spirit and the letter, skulked
from his, and brought the match about in his own time, to rid him-
self of a burden he had grown tired of, and cast a spurious lustre on
his house?'
'I have acted,' cried Mr. Haredale, 'with honour and in good
faith. I do so now. Do not force me to renew this duel to-night! '
'You said my "wretched" son, I think?' said Sir John, with a
smile. 'Poor fool! The dupe of such a shallow knave ā trapped into
marriage by such an uncle and by such a niece ā he well deserves
your pity. But he is no longer a son of mine: you are welcome to
the prize your craft has made, sir.'
'Once more,' cried his opponent, wildly stamping on the ground,
'although you tear me from my better angel, I implore you not to
come within the reach of my sword to-night. Oh! why were you
here at all! Why have we met! To-morrow would have cast us
far apart for ever ! '
'That being the case,' returned Sir John, without the least emo-
tion, 'it is very fortunate we have met to-night. Haredale, I have
always despised you, as you know, but I have given you credit for
BARNABY RUDGE 639
a species of brute courage. For the honour of my judgment, which
I had thought a good one, I am sorry to find you a coward.'
Not another word was spoken on either side. They crossed
swords, though it was now quite dusk, and attacked each other
fiercely. They were well matched, and each was thoroughly skilled
in the management of his weapon.
After a few seconds they grew hotter and more furious, and
pressing on each other inflicted and received several slight wounds.
It was directly after receiving one of these in his arm, that Mr.
Haredale, making a keener thrust as he felt the warm blood spirt-
ing out, plunged his sword through his opponent's body to the hilt.
Their eyes met, and were on each other as he drew it out. He put
his arm about the dying man, who repulsed him, feebly, and
dropped upon the turf. Raising himself upon his hands, he gazed
at him for an instant, with scorn and hatred in his look; but, seem-
ing to remember, even then, that this expression would distort his
features after death, he tried to smile, and, faintly moving his right
hand, as if to hide his bloody linen in his vest, fell back dead ā the
phantom of last night.
CHAPTER THE LAST
A PARTING glance at such of the actors in this little history as it has
not, in the course of its events, dismissed, will bring it to an end.
Mr. Haredale fled that night. Before pursuit could be begun,
indeed before Sir John was traced or missed, he had left the king-
dom. Repairing straight to a religious establishment, known
throughout Europe for the rigour and severity of its discipline, and
for the mercfless penitence it exacted from those who sought its
shelter as a refuge from the world, he took the vows which thence-
forth shut him out from nature and its kind, and after a few re-
morseful years was buried in its gloomy cloisters.
Two days elapsed before the body of Sir John was found. As
soon as it was recognised and carried home, the faithful valet, true
640 BARNABY RUDGE
to his master's creed, eloped with all the cash and movables he
could lay his hands on, and started as a finished gentleman upon
his own account. In this career he met with great success, and
would certainly have married an heiress in the end, but for an un-
lucky check which led to his premature decease. He sank under a
contagious disorder, very prevalent at that time, and vulgarly
termed the jail fever.
Lord George Gordon, remaining in his prison in the Tower until
Monday the Fifth of February in the following year, was on that
day solemnly tried at Westminster for High Treason. Of this crime
he was, after a patient investigation, declared Not Guilty; upon
the ground that there was no proof of his having called the multi-
tude together with any traitorous or unlawful intentions. Yet so
many people were there, still, to whom those riots taught no lesson
of reproof or moderation, that a public subscription was set on foot
in Scotland to defray the cost of his defence.
For seven years afterwards he remained, at the strong interces-
sion of his friends, comparatively quiet; saving that he, every now
and then, took occasion to display his zeal for the Protestant faith
in some extravagant proceeding which was the delight of its ene-
mies; and saving, besides, that he was formally excommunicated
by the Archbishop of Canterbury, for refusing to appear as a wit-
ness in the Ecclesiastical Court when cited for that purpose. In the
year 1788 he was stimulated by some new insanity to write and
publish an injurious pamphlet, reflecting on the Queen of France, in
very violent terms. Being indicted for the libel, and (after various
strange demonstrations in court) found guilty, he fled into Hol-
land in place of appearing to receive sentence: from whence, as the
quiet burgomasters of Amsterdam had no relish for his company,
he was sent home again with all speed. Arriving in the month of
July at Harwich, and going thence to Birmingham, he made in the
latter place, in August, a public profession of the Jewish religion;
and figured there as a Jew until he was arrested, and brought back
to London to receive the sentence he had evaded. By virtue of this
sentence he was, in the month of December, cast into Newgate for
five years and ten months, and required besides to pay a large fine,
and to furnish heavy securities for his future good behaviour.
After addressing, in the midsummer of the following year, an
BARNABY RUDGE 041
appeal to the commiseration of the National Assembly or France,
which the English minister refused to sanction, he composed him-
self to undergo his full term of punishment; and suffering his beard
to grow nearly to his waist, and conforming in all respects to the
ceremonies of his new religion, he applied himself to the study of
history, and occasionally to the art of painting, in which, in his
younger days, he had shown some skill. Deserted by his former
friends, and treated in all respects like the worst criminal in the
jail, he lingered on, quite cheerful and resigned, until the ist of
November, 1793, when he died in his cell, being then only three-
and-forty years of age.
Many men with fewer sympathies for the distressed and needy,
with less abilities and harder hearts, have made a shining figure
and left a brilliant fame. He had his mourners. The prisoners be-
moaned his loss, and missed him; for though his means were not
large, his charity was great, and in bestowing alms among them he
considered the necessities of all alike, and knew no distinction of
sect or creed. There are wise men in the highways of the world who
may learn something, even from this poor crazy lord who died in
Newgate.
To the last, he was truly served by bluff John Grueby. John was
at his side before he had been four-and-twenty hours in the Tower,
and never left him until he died. He had one other constant attend-
ant, in the person of a beautiful Jewish girl ; who attached herself to
him from feelings half religious, half romantic, but whose virtuous
and disinterested character appears to have been beyond the cen-
sure even of the most censorious.
Gashford deserted him, of course. He subsisted for a time upon
his traffic in his masters secrets; and, this trade failing when the
stock was quite exhausted, procured an appointment in the hon-
ourable corps of spies and eaves-droppers employed by the govern-
ment. As one of these wretched underlings, he did his drudgery,
sometimes abroad, sometimes at home, and long endured the va-
rious miseries of such a station. Ten or a dozen years ago ā not
more ā a meagre, wan old man, diseased and miserably poor, was
found dead in his bed at an obscure inn in the Borough, where he
was quite unknown. He had taken poison. There was no clue to his
name ; but it was discovered from certain entries in a pocket-book
642 BARNABY RUDGE
he carried, that he had been secretary to Lord George Gordon in
the time of the famous riots.
Many months after the re-establishment of peace and order, and
even when it had ceased to be the town-talk, that every military
officer, kept at free quarters by the City during the late alarms, had
cost for his board and lodging four pounds four per day, and every
private soldier two and twopence half-penny; many months after
even this engrossing topic was forgotten, and the United Bull-dogs
were to a man all killed, imprisoned, or transported, Mr. Simon
Tappertit, being removed from a hospital to prison, and thence to
his place of trial, was discharged by proclamation, on two wooden
legs. Shorn of his graceful limbs, and brought down from his high
estate to circumstances of utter destitution, and the deepest mis-
ery, he made shift to stump back to his old master, and beg for
some relief. By the locksmiths advice and aid, he was established in
business as a shoeblack, and opened shop under an archway near
the Horse Guards. This being a central quarter, he quickly made a
very large connection ; and on levee days, was sometimes known to
have as many as twenty half-pay officers waiting their turn for
polishing. Indeed his trade increased to that extent, that in course
of time he entertained no less than two apprentices, besides taking
for his wife the widow of an eminent bone and rag collector, for-
merly of Milbank. With this lady (who assisted in the business) he
lived in great domestic happiness, only chequered by those little
storms which serve to clear the atmosphere of wedlock, and bright-
en its horizon. In some of these gusts of bad weather, Mr. Tapper-
tit would, in the assertion of his prerogative, so far forget himself,
as to correct his lady with a brush, or boot, or shoe; while she (but
only in extreme cases) would retaliate by taking off his legs, and
leaving him exposed to the derision of those urchins who delight in
mischief.
Miss Miggs, baffled in all her schemes, matrimonial and other-
wise, and cast upon a thankless, undeserving world, turned very
sharp and sour; and did at length become so acid, and did so pinch
and slap and tweak the hair and noses of the youth of Golden Lion
Court, that she was by one consent expelled that sanctuary, and
desired to bless some other spot of earth, in preference. It chanced
at that moment, that the justices of the peace for Middlesex pro-
BARNABY RUDGE 643
claimed by public placard that they stood in need of a female turn-
key for the County Bridewell, and appointed a day and hour for
the inspection of candidates. Miss Miggs attending at the time ap-
pointed, was instantly chosen and selected from one hundred and
twenty-four competitors, and at once promoted to the office ; which
she held until her decease, more than thirty years afterwards, re-
maining single all that time. It was observed of this lady that while
she was inflexible and grim to all her female flock, she was particu-
larly so to those who could establish any claim to beauty: and it
was often remarked as a proof of her indomitable virtue and severe
chastity, that to such as had been frail she showed no mercy; al-
ways falling upon them on the slightest occasion, or on no occasion
at all, with the fullest measure of her wrath. Among other useful
inventions which she practised upon this class of offenders and be-
queathed to posterity, was the art of inflicting an exquisitely vi-
cious poke or dig with the wards of a key in the small of the back,
near the spine. She likewise originated a mode of treading by acci-
dent (in pattens) on such as had small feet; also very remarkable
for its ingenuity, and previously quite unknown.
It was not very long, you may be sure, before Joe Willet and
Dolly Varden were made husband and wife, and with a handsome
sum in bank (for the locksmith could afford to give his daughter a
good dowry), reopened the IVIaypole. It was not very long, you
may be sure, before a red-faced little boy was seen staggering about
the Maypole passage, and kicking up his heels on the green before
the door. It was not very long, counting by years, before there was
a red-faced little girl, another red-faced little boy, and a whole
troop of girls and boys: so that, go to Chigwell when you would,
there would surely be seen, either in the village street, or on the
green, or frolicking in the farm-yard ā for it was a farm now, as
well as a tavern ā more small Joes and small Dollys than could
be easily counted. It was not a very long time before these appear-
ances ensued; but it was a very long time before Joe looked five
years older, or Dolly either, or the locksmith either, or his wife
either: for cheerfulness and content are great beautifiers, and are
famous preservers of youthful looks, depend upon it.
It was a long time, too, before there was such a country inn as
the Maypole, in all England; indeed it is a great question whether
644 BARNABY RUDGE
there has ever been such another to this hour, or ever will be. It
was a long time too ā for Never, as the proverb says, is a long day
ā before they forgot to have an interest in wounded soldiers at the
Maypole, or before Joe omitted to refresh them, for the sake of his
old campaign; or before the serjeant left off looking in there, now
and then; or before they fatigued themselves, or each other, by
talking on these occasions of battles and sieges, and hard weather
and hard service, and a thousand things belonging to a soldier's
life. As to the great silver snuff-box which the King sent Joe with
his own hand, because of his conduct in the Riots, what guest ever
went to the Maypole without putting finger and thumb into that
box, and taking a great pinch, though he had never taken a pinch
of snuff before, and almost sneezed himself into convulsions even
:hen? As to the purple-faced vintner, where is the man who lived
in those times and never saw him at the ^laypole: to all appear-
ance as much at home in the best room, as if he lived there? And
as to the feastings and christenings, and revellings at Christmas,
and celebrations of birthdays, wedding-days, and all manner of
days, both at the Maypole and the Golden Key, ā if they are not
notorious, what facts are?
Mr. Willet the elder, having been by some extraordinary means
possessed with the idea that Joe wanted to be married, and that it
would be well for him, his father, to retire into private life, and en-
able him to live in comfort, took up his abode in a small cottage at
Chigwell; where they widened and enlarged the fireplace for him,
hung up the boiler, and furthermore planted in the little garden
outside the front-door, a fictitious Maypole; so that he was quite
at home directly. To this, his new habitation, Tom Cobb, Phil
Parkes, and Solomon Daisy went regularly every night: and
in the chimney-corner, they all four quaffed, and smoked, and
prosed, and dozed, as they had done of old. It being accidentally
discovered after a short time that Mr. Willet still appeared to con-
sider himself a landlord by profession, Joe provided him with a
slate, upon which the old man regularly scored up vast accounts
for meat, drink, and tobacco. As he grew older this passion in-
creased upon him; and it became his delight to chalk against the
name of each of his cronies a sum of enormous magnitude, and im-
possible to be paid: and such was his secret joy in these entries,
BARNABY RUDGE 645
that he would be perpetually seen going behind the door to look at
them, and coming forth again, suffused with the liveliest satisfac-
tion.
He never recovered the surprise the Rioters had given him, and
remained in the same mental condition down to the last moment of
his life. It was like to have been brought to a speedy termination
by the first sight of his first grandchild, which appeared to fill him
with the belief that some alarming miracle had happened to Joe.
Being promptly blooded, however, by a skilful surgeon, he ral-
lied; and although the doctors all agreed, on his being attacked
with symptoms of apoplexy six months afterwards, that he ought
to die, and took it very ill that he "did not, he remained alive ā pos-
sibly on account of his constitutional slowness ā for nearly seven
years more, when he was one morning found speechless in his bed.
He lay in this state, free from all tokens of uneasiness, for a whole
week, when he was suddenly restored to consciousness by hearing
the nurse whisper in his son's ears that he was going. 'I'm a-going,
Joseph,' said Mr. Willet, turning round upon the instant, ^to the
Salwanners' ā and immediately gave up the ghost.
He left a large sum of money behind him; even more than he
was supposed to have been worth, although the neighbours, ac-
cording to the custom of mankind in calculating the wealth that
other people ought to have saved, had estimated his property in
good round numbers. Joe inherited the whole; so that he became
a man of great consequence in those parts, and was perfectly inde-
pendent.
Some time elapsed before Barnaby got the better of the shock he
had sustained, or regained his old health and gaiety. But he '*ecov-
ered by degrees; and although he could never separate his con-
demnation and escape from the idea of a terrific dream, he became,
in other respects, more rational. Dating from the time of his re-
covery, he had a better memory and greater steadiness of purpose;
but a dark cloud overhung his whole previous existence, and never
cleared away.
He was not the less happy for this ; for his love of freedom and
interest in all that moved or grew, or had its being in the elements,
remained to him unimpaired. He lived with his mother on the May-
pole farm, tending the poultry and the cattle, working in a garden
646 BARNABY RUDGE
of his own, and helping everywhere. He was known to every bird
and beast about the place, and had a name for every one. Never
was there a lighter-hearted husbandman, a creature more popular
with young and old, a blither or more happy soul than Barnaby;
and though he was free to ramble where he would, he never quitted
Her, but was for evermore her stay and comfort.
It was remarkable that although he had that dim sense of the
past, he sought out Hugh's dog, and took him under his care; and
that he never could be tempted into London. When the Riots were
many years old, and Edward and his wife came back to England
with a family almost as numerous as Dolly's, and one day appeared
at the Maypole porch, he knew them instantly, and wept and
leaped for joy. But neither to visit them, nor on any other pre-
tence, no matter how full of promise and enjoyment, could he be
persuaded to set foot in the streets: nor did he ever conquer his
repugnance or look upon the town again.
Grip soon recovered his looks, and became as glossy and sleek as
ever. But he was profoundly silent. Whether he had forgotten the
art of Polite Conversation in Newgate, or had made a vow in those
troubled times to forego, for a period, the display of his accom-
plishments, is a matter of uncertainty; but certain it is that for a
whole year he never indulged in any other sound than a grave, de-
corous croak. At the expiration of that term, the morning being
very bright and sunny, he was heard to address himself to the
horses in the stable, upon the subject of the Kettle, so often men-
tioned in these pages; and before the witness who overheard him
could run into the house with the intelligence, and add to it upon his
solemn affirmation the statement that he had heard him laugh, the
bird himself advanced with fantastic steps to the very door of the
bar, and there cried 'I'm a devil, I'm a devil, Fm a devil!' with ex-
traordinary rapture.
From that period (although he was supposed to be much affected
by the death of Mr. Wlllet senior), he constantly practised and im-
proved himself in the vulgar tongue; and, as he was a mere infant
for a raven when Barnaby was grey, he has very probably gone on
talking to the present time.
THE END
MASTER HUMPHREY'S CLOCK
CLEARTYPE EDITION
THE WORKS OF
CHARLES DICKENS
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
MASTER HUMPHREY'S CLOCK
BOOKS, INC.
NEW YORK BOSTON
TO
SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQUIRE
My Dear Sir,
Let me have my Pleasures of Memory in connection with
this book, by dedicating it to a Poet whose writings (as all the
world knows) are replete with generous and earnest feeling;
and to a man whose daily life (as all the world does not know)
is one of active sympathy with the poorest and humblest of
his kind.
Your faithful friend,
Charles Dickens
CONTENTS
Master Humphrey^ s Clock
Dedication
PAGE
V
Prefaces ix
I. Master Humphrey, from his Clock-side in the
Chimney Corner 1
II. Master Humphrey, from his Clock-side in the
Chimney Corner 27
III. Master Humphrey's Visitor 44
IV. The Clock 73
V. Mr. Weller's Watch 82
VI. Master Humphrey, from his Clock-side in the
Chimney Corner 90
VIJ
PREFACES, ETC.
ADDRESS BY CHARLES DICKENS
Master Humphrey earnestly hopes, (and is almost tempted to
believe,) that all degrees of readers, young or old, rich or poor,
sad or merry, easy of amusement or difficult to entertain, may find
something agreeable in the face of his old clock. That, when they
have made its acquaintance, its voice may sound cheerfully in their
ears, and be suggestive of none but pleasant thoughts. That they
may come to have favourite and familiar associations connected
with its name, and to look for it as for a welcome friend.
From week to week, then, Master Humphrey will set his clock,
trusting that while it counts the hours, it will sometimes cheat
them of their heaviness, and that while it marks the thread of
Time, it will scatter a few slight flowers in the Old Mower's path.
Until the specified period arrives, and he can enter freely upon
that confidence with his readers which he is impatient to main-
tain, he may only bid them a short farewell, and look forward to
their next meeting.
PREFACE TO THE FIRST VOLUME
When the Author commenced this Work, he proposed to himself
three objects ā
First. To establish a periodical, which should enable him to
present, under one general head, and not as separate and distinct
publications, certain fictions that he had it in contemplation to
write.
Secondly. To produce these Tales in weekly numbers, hoping
that to shorten the intervals of communication between himself
and his readers, would be to knit more closely the pleasant relations
they had held, for Forty Months.
ix
X MASTER HUMPHREY'S CLOCK
Thirdly. In the execution of this weekly task, to have as much
regard as its exigencies would permit, to each story as a whole, and
to the possibility of its publication at some distant day, apart
from the machinery in which it had its origin.
The characters of Master Humphrey and his three friends, and
the little fancy of the clock, were the results of these considera-
tions. When he sought to interest his readers in those who talked,
and read, and listened, he revived Mr. Pickwick and his humble
friends; not with any intention of reopening an exhausted and
abandoned mine, but to connect them in the thoughts of those
whose favourites they had been, with the tranquil enjoyments of
Master Humphrey.
It was never the intention of the Author to make the Members
of Master Humphrey's clock, active agents in the stories they are
supposed to relate. Having brought himself in the commencement
of his undertaking to feel an interest In these quiet creatures, and
to imagine them in their old chamber of meeting, eager listeners
to all he had to tell, the Author hoped ā as authors will ā to succeed
in awakening some of his own emotion in the bosoms of his read-
ers. Imagining Master Humphrey in his chimney corner, resum-
ing night after night the narrative, ā say, of the Old Curiosity