University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.

When Harry Vernon entered the hall the next
morning, the first person he met was Master Thomas
Horsey, who encountered him, selon des règles, in
the most approved fashion of the theatrical world,
with a fitting quotation, to provide himself with
which, he had, no doubt, groped half the night
through his pocket Shakspeare.

“ `My cousin Vernon! welcome, by my soul!'
I've been waiting for you, sir, with the impatience
of a thirsty throat, to which any thing like delay in
the antifogmatic, is almost certain bronchitis. Here,
sir, is garden mint—fresh, sir—I pulled it myself; or,
if you prefer the animal julep, here is an egg—I did
not lay it myself, but will warrant it quite as fresh as
the mint. The whiskey is at your elbow, the peach
at mine, and the sooner we fall to, the better. `A
good sherris sack hath a two fold operation in it.'
Which take you?—none!”

Horsey put down his own glass in wonder. The
idea of refusing a morning dram had never entered
his brain.

“You are not serious, Mr. Vernon?—you will
surely take one or t'other—the peach brandy?”

“Neither, Mr. Horsey. You must excuse me; it
is not a habit with me to drink in the morning.”

“It is not, eh? Well, I'm sorry—sorry for your
sake not less than my own. The habit were not a
bad one, Mr. Vernon, nevertheless; and I commend
you to better examples in this particular than it has
been your fortune to fall upon. I drink, sir, to our
better acquaintance. I should have relished much to
have had some conversation with you last night, but
that `learned Theban,' Master Benjamin Carter,
making his appearance, sent me off in a jiffy, and
dammed up my ideas quite as effectually as if he had
run the great raft of the Mississippi-bend into my
brain. He's a sober old boy, that, Harry Monmouth—likes
not my merriment—`he loves no
plays,' and still less players, `and smiles in such a
sort.' I tell you what, Master Vernon, though no
man can think of Ben Carter more worthily than
I do, yet, by the faith that is within me, I fear
him, something—that is `I rather tell thee what is
to be feared than what I fear.' He hath ever been
a sort of curb upon me; he sees through my follies,
when dad is about to reward them as virtues; and
the tricks which would triumph over every body
else, he seems to unravel as easily, and trace home
to the true author as certainly, as if he had a gift
of divining. He's a relation of yours, Master
Vernon?”

“No, sir—none—an acquaintance of my father
and friend of the family.”

“You're from below?—left the old people?—
'Egad I had almost asked if you had not left them
with light heels and lighter heart. I've been so
much used to doing that sort of business myself,
that the suspicion was natural enough, though,
seeing you with Ben Carter, such a conjecture
would have been very foolish. You're a lawyer?

Come to plead at Raymond?—got any business to
go upon yet?” &c.

Young Horsey resembled his father in one respect:
he had all his curiosity. We have thrown into the
compass of one paragraph the hundred questions
which he contrived to ask before the rest of the
family made their appearance. In the sight of
Carter his ardour was something restrained, though,
in the mild, benignant countenance of the latter,
one would seek in vain for that sign of power to
which the young actor ascribed so much potency.
He finished his breakfast before the rest, and, as he
left the room, catching the eye of Vernon, he put on
the aspect and manner of an awkward clown, terrified
at finding himself in so solemn presence, and
striving to leave it with as little noise as necessary,
by moving on tip-toe and backward to the entrance.
Once there, he bounded from the steps, and by a
single agile movement was in the middle of the road.
The next moment he might be heard, spouting a
favourite passage at the very top of his voice.

“If Tom would only leave off that d—d player-book,”
began the father apologetically to Carter.

“It is a folly that will do no harm, my good
friend, unless you stimulate it by harsh usage. The
book is innocent enough—it is not that, but the love
of praise, which turns your son's head. Listen to
his speeches patiently, and he will think you the best
audience he ever had; and if you can sometimes
contrive to clap your hands together in this manner
when he has concluded his speech—”

“As they do at the theatre-houses?” demanded
the father with some eagerness.

“Ay—even so.”

“Well, Carter, what then—what'll be the good
of it?”

“I think it not unlikely he will be content to stay
at home with you and mind his business.”

“But he promises to do so now, Ben Carter. He
says he's done with Orleans and the play-houses.
He has good reason for it, I can tell you. He's
grazed upon the sheriff at Orleans, and had a queer
bout with the head man of the theatre. He told us all
about it last night—I didn't quite see into the fun of
the thing, but Tom says it was deused funny, and Mr.
Vernon was mightily tickled at the story. I think
there is a change in Tom, and as he promises so
fair—”

“Don't rely too much upon his promises. He cannot
so soon break away from his old habits, and must
be allowed some little farther swing before he dismisses
his levities sufficiently to suffer him to come
home and go to work. Only do not by unnecessary
harshness drive him into them. Notice his follies as
little as may be, and tolerate his speeches even where
you do not exactly understand them. The scorn of a
father, not unfrequently drives a son to defiance;
when some little indulgence to his idle tastes, might
leave him free to see into their absurdities himself.
Let me warn you, however, to give him as little
money as possible. He wants but little in the country,
and where he asks for much, it is a sure sign of
profligacy. Do not expect to see him sober on a
sudden. I would rather he should not become so.
I should suspect him of a worse offence still, than
any you have against him—hypocrisy. The best
sign in his favour, since his return, is that he still
continues his spouting, knowing your hostility to the
practice—though it may prove him wanting in proper
reverence, it saves him at least from the suspicion
of disingenuousness. Give him employment as soon
as you can, and let time do the rest. A sudden
change is seldom to be relied on; and a transition

from one extreme to another, is almost always the
practice of a rogue.”

“But Tom is honest—Tom's no rogue, Ben
Carter.”

“I believe it, Horsey. Do you take care that
you do not make him one. It is not uncommon for
you to denounce him as a rogue—to call him rascal
and scoundrel, and such abusive names as these. To
give him the rogue's reputation, is to take from him
one of the great inducements to be an honest man.
Beware that you do not this.”

Meanwhile, the subject of this discussion was pursuing
his walk, with all the heedlessness of a wayward
mind, through all the nooks and crannies of
the village. He was busy seeking out old haunts
and old associates. Tom Horsey was popular with
every body in Raymond but his father. His pompous
declamations, his noisy humour, the readiness
with which he joined in a joke, and the steadfastness
with which he pursued it, commended him naturally
to all the younger portions of the community; and
now that he re-appeared among them, there were
salutations on every hand. Smiles and pleasant
speeches, that inflated the vain heart of the youth to
the utmost, encountered him at every corner, and he
swaggered along the main street with the air of one
conscious that his movements were witnessed by an
audience far more indulgent than ever Richmond
found at Orleans, even when he bestrid the tyrant,
and commanded his own terms from the prostrate
and ungenerous manager.

There was a miserable little rookery that stood at
the western entrance of the village, where a still more
miserable sort of business was carried on by a man
named Hawkins. This man was an idle, worthless
creature, and his obvious pursuits were supposed by
many persons to be only a sort of cover for other objects

which were, possibly, far more profitable, though
not so legitimate. In his shop might be seen a barrel
of whisky, a kitt of tobacco, a few knives, pipes,
candles, and 'coon-skins; seldom any thing more;
but there were shed-rooms to his dwelling, and upper
chambers, which were asserted to be very well fitted
up, in which no limited profits were made out of the
ignorant and the unwary. Public justice had her
eye upon this establishment, but, up to the present
time, nothing had transpired of sufficient importance
to justify her in setting her hands upon the lintel.
The proprietor kept a closer watch upon her movements,
than her emissaries maintained over his; and
whatever might have been the suspicions of the
neighbours, Hawkins met them with a bold front, and
challenged their inquiries.

To this house the actor drew nigh. His approach
was watched by the proprietor and another man,
who stood with him at the entrance.

“Here is the very chap himself,” said Hawkins.
“This is the younger Horsey—the crazy actor—who
run away to Orleans, and paid the manager, it is said,
for permission to appear and spend his father's picayunes
as fast as they are made. Yet the old fool
dotes upon him, and will leave himself bare to give
the youngster his buff breeches. By a little management
we may get out of him all that we want to
know, or, at least, all that he is able to tell. He is
vain of his abilities as an actor, and by feeding his
swallow, we may easily pick his teeth.”

“Is it he that struts so?” demanded the other.

“The same. This stranger Vernon, lodges with
his father. It is known that he inquired for Carter
on his first arrival, and received directions to the
house of Horsey.”

“And what can this silly fellow know? If he be
the man you speak him, would they be fools enough
to trust him with any of their secrets?”

“Scarcely—I do not hope for that. But Tom
Horsey is one of those restless, fidgetty sort of persons,
who are continually meddling with the affairs of
other people. He will glean from his father all that
he knows of Carter and Vernon, and if they are not
exceedingly sly, he will see into their concerns as far
as themselves.”

“It can do no harm to sound him. He draws
nigh.”

Hawkins advanced from the doorway, and addressed
the actor in a fashion of his own.

“ `Horatio, or I do mistake myself.' ”

“ `The same,' Mr. Hawkins, `and your good servant
ever.' How does the world use you—still in
the old stand, I see.”

“Ay, Tom, and at a stand. But where have you
been this year of Sundays. I haven't seen you `since
the gander's neck was last soaped.' ”

“ `No more of that, Hal, an thou lovest me,' ” was
the reply, followed by a hearty laugh from both, as
the phrase, which may seem somewhat mysterious
to any but southern readers, reminded them of one
of those practical jokes, in which it was Tom Horsey's
misfortune too frequently to indulge. “No
more of that, Hawkins, I pray you—let that story
be forgotten.”

“Forgotten, indeed!—impossible; the story's quite
too good, and I must tell it to my friend here, Saxon,
Mr. Thomas Horsey, Tom, my friend Ellis Saxon, a
gentleman from the Yazoo—a glorious fellow like
yourself, loves a joke from the bottom of his heart,
and will die some day in a frolic—”

“In a ditch!” cried Horsey, concluding the sentence.
“Pardon me, Mr. Saxon, the prediction is
just as like and more like to fall upon me than upon
you; and it's an old rhyme of a song that the Western
boys sing when they're boating down to Orleans;”
and he repeated the lines that follow:

“A good song—I've heard it a hundred times,
though not lately. The boatmen are done up now.
These steam-sturgeons have cut up as pretty a branch
of business as ever needed a long pole, and deserved
a glorious frolic. But what of that, Tom Horsey?
Is there to be no pleasure in the world because we
can get to Orleans now in ten days in place of forty?
If the steam-sturgeon does up the `broad horn,'
there's a long horn that raises the steam. Come in,
my son, and take a sup of whisky while I tell Saxon
about the goose's neck.”

“No, no, Hawkins, let that dog sleep. I'll come
in and join you with the whisky, but no scratching
old sores, say I.”

“What, you're not afraid of consequences now—
don't you know the old Squire's done up—gone to
his long nap. He'll never trouble you about it,
sonny.”

“No matter, I've sworn off from these tricks, Bill
Hawkins!—I've promised the old man to put on a
straight coat, crop my hair and go to meeting o'
Sundays—”

“And be at all the love-feasts!—what of all that,
Tom?—do you think to keep your neighbour from being
happy because you have grown sour. `Because
thou art virtuous, shall there be no more cakes and
ale?' Come in, thou reluctant saint, who would put on
two faces of tragedy and comedy at the same time—
come in, and Saxon will tell you of a splendid blowout
on the Georgiana steamboat, going up the river
last month. They had a play on board, Tom Horsey—an
amateur play—and played Julius Cæsar to
more than four hundred persons, the part of Brutus
by an old friend, Hugh Peters, the limping schoolmaster
at Clinton.”

“Hugh Peters play Brutus—the impudent pedagogue!
You don't say so, Mr. Saxon, do tell me
all the particulars. Hugh Peters, indeed! What
could have put it into the leatherhead to think that
he could play Brutus?”

“What, but hearing us spout the dialogue at
school,—`That you have wronged me,' &c. But
come in—the water's on the fire, and the whisky
on the stand.”

The news of the amateur performance was quite
enough for the mercurial Horsey. His good resolutions
were forgotten in an instant, and in two minutes
more he was sitting between Hawkins and Saxon, in
a little cupboard-like apartment, back of the house,
a kettle upon the fire, glasses upon the table, and
every thing in preparation for one of those regular
rounds to which the young actor was already but
too much accustomed.

“These steamboats have their advantages after
all; and so, Mr. Saxon, the chaps on board the
Georgiana got up a tolerable piece of work, did
they?”

“Ay, on the upper deck, Mr. Horsey; and considering
the short preparation they had, the thing
was really well done. There was one chap, an
actor from Orleans, named Tilton—”

“Tilton, I know him—a mere candle-snuffer—
what the d—l did he pretend to do?” demanded
Horsey, interrupting the speaker.

“He played Cæsar—played the ghost rather, and
did it so well, that he scared the women half to
death. His face was so pale—I can't conceive how
he could have brought himself to so death-like a
complexion.”

“Psha, sir, the easiest thing in the world—a
little chalk or magnesia does it,—and as for the
whiskers, the mustache, the imperial, and such small

matters, they lie, sir, at the end of a burnt cork, and
may be had at a moment's warning.”

“Ah, indeed!” was the response of Mr. Saxon,
made with the utmost seeming simplicity.

The conceited Thespian continued:

“These are the arts, sir, of the actor; and, though
not absolutely essential to the artist, yet you cannot
conceive how much they help the imagination of the
spectator; in the arousing of which lies, probably,
the great secret of the good dramatist and perfect
actor; but what you tell me of `Little Bowlegs'—so
we used to call Hugh Peters,—`Ye gods it doth
amaze me!' to think that he should presume to play
at all, and then to play Brutus—'twas a test part—
a fellow that talks through his nose, and swings his
arms about like a windmill;—that walks, for all the
world, like a strutting gobler, and has a face like a
squash. Ha! ha! it must have been very ridiculous,
Mr. Saxon.”

“Not at all,” was the reply. “We were all too
dull, and wanting something to enliven us, the thing
did well enough; and there were some present, who
thought Cæsar was done quite as well as C—well
himself could have done it.”

“C—well be d—d!” was the irreverent response
of Horsey to this opinion.

“Pardon me, Mr. Saxon; I mean no offence, but
it agitates my bile, when I hear C—well spoken of
in tragedy. I should think better of Herr Cline, the
rope dancer. `I'm a soused gurnet,' sir, if C—well
is any thing but a comedian,—a devilish clever comedian,
who spoils himself by attempting any thing
else; and as for these folks in the steamboat, being
pleased with such performers as Tilton and `Little
Bowlegs,' they must have been most cursedly tired
of the boat, or must have had the smallest possible
particle of good taste and good sense among them.

`Brutus, Hugh Peters,' `Julius Cæsar, Jim Tilton,'—
candle-snuffers in extraordinary for the American
Theatre—it's very ridiculous. Hawkins—trouble
you for that spoon and the sugar.”

A quiet smile of contempt played over the cold,
dark features of Saxon, as he saw the importance
which the youth annexed to the matter, and beheld
the swelling indignation with which he spoke of the
despised amateurs. As if disposed to humour the
folly and conceit of the youth, he continued the
topic.

“But are you not exceedingly aristocratic in your
notions, Mr. Horsey? Because a man has been
forced to snuff candles, does it follow that he is incapable
of something better?”

“Surely not, sir, surely not. The fates forbid
that I should deal in such a pernicious doctrine.
What was Shakspeare himself, my masters;—his
early career is enough, without other authority, to
prevent me from such sheer folly of opinion; but
Tilton is no Shakspeare, nor no Garrick; and how
ever he may have played the ghost of Cæsar, I tell
you, he will be nothing but a miserable candle-snuffer
all his life. Look you, I reason thus, Mr. Saxon. I
have seen our friend Hawkins jump for a wager, and
know his best pitch to a feather's width. Shall I not
be able to say, thus far can Bill Hawkins jump, and
no farther? Even thus do I tell you that Tilton was
born to be a candle-snuffer, and nothing better—unless
it be a call-boy on the stage.”

“Yet was it said,” remarked Saxon quietly, “that
he was going to open the theatres at Vicksburg and
Natchez.”

“ `Gods, grant us patience!'—but it is scarce possible!”

“I heard as much myself,” was the confirmatory
statement of Hawkins.

“The d—d fool!—He's mad—utterly mad. On
the word of a gentleman, Mr. Saxon, this fellow has
no sort of rank—no reputation—no ability. Were
I a manager, he should have no employment at my
hands. The fellow is perfectly incapable.”

“He is going to have a roaring company, nevertheless,”
said Hawkins. “He's engaged Peters for
third-rate characters, and is getting up recruits from
every quarter.”

“`I shall forget myself!' Was there ever such
an insolent pretender!”

The amateur was almost furious. The moment
had arrived when he could be best practised upon;
and the game was continued.

“They say he has taken up actors even here in
Raymond. Was not this young fellow Vernon, one
of his men?” was the inquiry of Saxon, urged with
a manner of the most perfect indifference.

“Yes, I think that was the name. He came into
town last night,” replied Hawkins.

“Who? what? Harry—Harry Vernon! Psha,
Hawkins, I know all about that. He's none of them
—he's no actor—nothing but a lawyer riding the
circuit. He's a sort of relation of sour Ben,—so we
call Ben Carter—and I 'spose the old boy's got
him some cases. He stayed with us last night, and
I took a julep with him this morning. Told me all
about it himself.”

“Indeed! He's a relation of Carter, and no actor,
then?” demanded Saxon.

“No!—he's no actor—has no notion of it. As
for his being a relation of sour Ben, I don't know
whether I'm right to say that—indeed, for that matter,
I think he told me he was not,—only an acquaintance.
No, he's no actor, I assure you; and if
all your information about Tilton and Bowlegs be

no better founded than this, I wouldn't give much
for the new theatre.”

“You may be deceived even in this, Mr. Horsey,”
said Saxon. “This young man Vernon, they say,
is going up into the Yazoo. Did he tell you that?”

“Lord, no! There's no truth in it, I'm certain,
and sour Ben is too strict a chap to be very close
with an actor. If he only once dreamed that Harry
Vernon had such a notion, he'd throw up his hand
in a minute. I know sour Ben too well: he'd cut
loose from the young 'un, and leave him just rope
enough to hang himself.”

“What you say rather strengthens the report. If
Vernon knows this of Carter, as without doubt he
does, would not this be reason enough why he should
keep his secret while under the old man's eye, particularly,
if he has any favour to look for at Carter's
hands, as it is said he has. Now, they do say, and
I may as well tell you, I heard it from Tilton himself
on board the Georgiana, that Vernon was engaged
secretly to play first characters.”

“The devil, you say—first characters!” was the
exclamation of the astounded amateur. “Who
could have believed it—the fellow was so sly.—But
I needn't wonder at that. Egad, I played a sly
game at first with Ben Carter myself. But, Harry
Monmouth—well, to confess a truth, the chap played
the sly one cleverly, if what you tell me be indeed
the truth. But I am not certain yet.”

“Look into it,” said Hawkins carelessly; “and so
sure am I that Saxon has good authority for what
he says, I'll go a quart, and a dozen cabanas upon
it.”

“Soh! it's a bet,” replied the amateur. “Our
hands upon it, Trojan, and it will be a close tongue
that can keep my worm from getting under it. I'll
through Harry Monmouth's knapsack before he takes

his crumbs out, or may I never look down upon the
footlights again. Mr. Saxon,”—drinking—“the
stage, sir, though it be carried in a steamboat.”

“Very good—devilish good, Tom,” cried Hawkins,
apparently delighted with the modest play upon
words which the actor had attempted. “You were
always clever at these things, but your frolic seems
to have freshened and improved you. But what did
the old man say, Tom, when you came back? The
story was that you had made his factor hand over
to the tune of three or four thousand dollars, which
you lost at faro in one night.”

“Not so bad as that, Hawkins, though bad enough
still. I have worried the old man something too
much, but I have promised him reformation, and—”

“Will keep your promise, if you can.”

“Well said, Hawkins,” responded the youth with
a sigh; “if I can. The task is a very difficult one;
for this d—d stuff you've been telling me of Tilton
and his floating theatre, has put me in a most inconceivable
state of combustion. I should think well of
the plan, if that wool-headed candle-snuffer had nothing
to do with it. In good hands a theatre at
Natchez—”

“Under the hill,” said Hawkins with a sneer.

“No, no! there's too much hell broth there; the
gruel is slab, but not good enough in that quarter,
unless in playing Tom and Jerry, to which I do not
much incline; but for a respectable establishment, I
doubt not that we should be able to keep it up, and
put money in our pockets, at least four months in
the year. We could then shift our quarters, as the
old players did, from one barn to another. We could
go to Vicksburg, Grand Gulf, Manchester, Port
Gibson, and all about, and drive the prettiest and
merriest gipsy business one could desire. `By the
Lord, our plot is a good plot as ever was laid!' but

it would spoil the best plot, ay, and the best play too,
to have such a botch as Tilton in the management.”

“Tilton, or no Tilton, Tom, remember the bet.
We must satisfy it before this youth, Vernon, leaves
Raymond.”

“My hand on't. But are you for court now—
what's to be done—any murder cases. I like to listen
to them; they are so many eggs for tragedy,
which unborn Shakspeares may hatch. What say
you, men,—go along with me.”

“Time enough; the court won't open for an hour,
and there are only a few cases of assault and battery;
nothing of interest. Stay awhile and sup your
whisky, and we'll go with you then. Saxon, your
glass waits.”

Let us leave the trio for awhile.