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3. [From the Author's Unpublished English Notes.]
ROGERS.
This man Rogers happened upon me and
introduced himself at the town of——
in the south of England, where I staid
awhile. His stepfather had married a distant
relative of mine who was afterwards
hanged, and so he seemed to think a
blood relationship existed between us.
He came in every day and sat down and
talked. Of all the bland, serene human
curiosities I ever saw, I think he was the
chiefest. He desired to look at my new
chimney-pot hat. I was very willing, for
I thought he would notice the name of the
great Oxford street hatter in it and respect
me accordingly. But he turned it about
with a sort of grave compassion, pointed
out two or three blemishes, and said that I,
being so recently arrived, could not be expected
to know where to supply myself.
Said he would send me the address of his
hatter. Then he said, “Pardon me,” and
proceeded to cut a neat circle of red tissue
paper; daintily notched the edges of it;
took the mucilage and pasted it in my hat so
as to cover the manufacturer's name. He
said, “No one will know now where you got
it. I will send you a hat-tip of my hatter
and you can paste it over this tissue circle.”
It was the calmest, coolest thing—I never
admired a man so much in my life. Mind,
he did this while his own hat sat offensively
near our noses, on the table—an ancient
and shapeless with age, discolored by
vicissitudes of the weather, and banded by
an equator of bear's grease that had
stewed through.
Another time he examined my coat. I
had no terrors, for over my tailor's door
was the legend, “By Special Appointment
Tailor to H. R. H. the Prince of Wales,
&c.” I did not know at the time that the
most of the tailor shops had the same sign
out, and that whereas it takes nine tailors
to make an ordinary man, it takes a hundred
and fifty to make a prince. He was
full of compassion for my coat. Wrote
down the address of his tailor for me.
Did not tell me to mention my nom de
plume and the tailor would put his best
work on my garment, as complimentary
people sometimes do, but said his tailor
would hardly trouble himself for an unknown
person (unknown person when I
thought I was so celebrated in England!—
that was the cruelest cut) but cautioned
me to mention his name, and it would be
all right. Thinking to be facetious, I said,
“But he might sit up all night and
injure his health.”
“Well, let him,” said Rogers; “I've
done enough for him for him to show some
appreciation of it.”
I might just as well have tried to disconcert
a mummy with my facetiousness.
Said Rogers,
“I get all my coats there—they're the
only coats fit to be seen in.”
I made one more attempt. I said, “I
wish you had brought one with you—I
would like to look at it.”
“Bless your heart, haven't I got one on?
—this article is Morgan's make.”
I examined it. The coat had been
bought ready-made, of a Chatham street
Jew, without any question—about 1848.
It probably cost four dollars when it was
new. It was ripped, it was frayed, it was
napless and greasy. I could not resist
showing him where it was ripped. It so
affected him that I was almost sorry I
had done it. First he seemed plunged into
a bottomless abyss of grief. Then he
roused himself, made a feint with his hands
as if waving off the pity of a nation, and
said—with what seemed to me a manufactured
emotion—“No matter; no matter;
don't mind me; do not bother about it. I
can get another.”
I prayed heaven he would not get another,
like that.
When he was thoroughly restored, so
that he could examine the rip and command
his feelings, he said,—ah, now he
understood it—his servant must have done
it while dressing him that morning.
His servant! There was something awe-inspiring
in effrontery like this.
Nearly every day he interested himself
in some article of my clothing. One would
hardly have expected this sort of infatuation
in a man who always wore the same
suit, and it a suit that seemed coeval with
the Conquest.
It was an unworthy ambition, perhaps,
but I did wish I could make this man
admire something about me or something
I did—you would have felt the same way.
I saw my opportunity: I was about to
return to London, and had “listed” my
soiled linen for the wash. It made quite
an imposing mountain in the corner of the
room—fifty-four pieces. I hoped he would
fancy it was the accumulation of a single
week. I took up the wash-list, as if to see
that it was all right, and then tossed it on
the table, with pretended forgetfulness.
Sure enough, he took it up and ran his eye
along down to the grand total. Then he
said, “You get off easy,” and laid it down
again.
His gloves were the saddest ruin—but he
told me where I could get some like them.
His shoes would hardly hold walnuts without
leaking, but he liked to put his feet up
on the mantel piece and contemplate them.
He wore a dim glass breastpin, which he
called a “morphylitic diamond”—whatever
that may mean—and said only two of
them had ever been found—the Emperor
of China had the other one.
Afterward in London, it was a pleasure
to me to see this fantastic vagabond come
marching into the lobby of the hotel in
his grand-ducal way, for he always had
some new imaginary grandeur to develop
—there was nothing stale about him but
his clothes. If he addressed me when
voice a little and called me “Sir Richard”
or “General,” or “Your Lordship”—and
when people began to stare and look deferential,
he would fall to inquiring in a
casual way why I disappointed the Duke
of Argyll the night before; and then remind
me of our engagement at the Marquis of
Westminster's for the following day. I
think that for the time being these things
were realities to him. He once came and
invited me to go with him and spend the
evening with the Earl of Warwick at his
town house. I said I had received no
formal invitation. He said that was of no
consequence—the Earl had no formalities
for him or his friends. I asked if I might
go just as I was. He said no, that would
hardly do—evening dress was requisite at
night in any gentleman's house. He said
he would wait while I dressed and then we
would go to his apartments and I could
take a bottle of champagne and a cigar
while he dressed. I was very willing to
see how this enterprise would turn out, so
I dressed, and we started to his lodgings.
He said if I didn't mind we would walk.
So we tramped some four miles through
the mud and fog, and finally found his
“apartments,” and they consisted of a
single room over a barber's shop in a back
street. Two chairs, a small table, an ancient
valise, a wash-basin and pitcher (both
on the floor in a corner) an unmade bed, a
fragment of a looking-glass, and a flowerpot
with a perishing little rose geranium in
it (which he called a century plant, and said
it had not bloomed now for upwards of
two centuries—given to him by the late
Lord Palmerston—been offered a prodigious
sum for it)—these were the contents
of the room. Also a brass candlestick
and part of a candle. Rogers lit the
candle, and told me to sit down and make
myself at home. He said he hoped I was
thirsty, because he would surprise my
palate with an article of champagne that
seldom got into a commoner's system—or
would I prefer sherry, or port? Said he
had port in bottles that were swathed
in stratified cobwebs, every stratum representing
a generation. And as for his cigars
—well, I should judge of them myself.
Then he put his head out at the door and
called—
“Sackville!” No answer.
“Hi!—Sackville!” No answer.
“Now what the devil can have become
of that butler? I never allow a servant to
—Oh, confound that idiot, he's got the
keys. Can't get into the other rooms
without the keys.”
(I was just wondering at his intrepidity
in still keeping up the delusion of the
champagne, and trying to imagine how he
was going to get out of the difficulty.)
Now he stopped calling Sackville and
began to call “Anglesy.” But Anglesy
didn't come. He said “This is the second
time that equerry has been absent without
leave. To-morrow I'll discharge him.”
Now he began to whoop for “Thomas,”
but Thomas didn't answer. Then for
“Theodore,” but no Theodore replied.
“Well, I give it up,” said Rogers. “The
servants never expect me at this hour, and
so they're all off on a lark. Might get
along without the equerry and the page,
but can't have any wine or cigars without
the butler, and can't dress without my
valet.”
I offered to help him dress, but he would
not hear of it—and besides, he said he
would not feel comfortable unless dressed
by a practised hand. However, he finally
concluded that he was such old friends
with the Earl that it would not make any
difference how he was dressed. So we
took a cab, he gave the driver some directions
and we started. By-and-by we
stopped before a large house and got out.
I never had seen this man with a collar on.
He now stepped under a lamp and got a
venerable paper collar out of his coat pocket,
along with a hoary cravat, and put them on.
He ascended the stoop, rang and entered
the door. Presently he re-appeared, descended
rapidly, and said,
“Come—quick!”
We hurried away, and turned the corner.
“Now we're safe,” he said—and took off
his collar and cravat and returned them to
his pocket.
“Made a mighty narrow escape,” said he.
“How?” said I.
“B' George, the Countess was there!”
“Well, what of that-don't she know you?”
“Know me? Absolutely worships me.
I just did happen to catch a glimpse of
her before she saw me—and out I shot.
Haven't seen her for two months—to rush
in on her without any warning might have
been fatal. She could not have stood it.
I didn't know she was in town—thought
she was at the castle. Let me lean on you
—just a moment—there, now I am better
—thank you; thank you ever so much.
Lord bless me, what an escape!”
So I never got to call on the Earl, after
all. But I marked his house for future
reference. It proved to be an ordinary
family hotel, with about a thousand plebeians
roosting in it.
In most things Rogers was by no means
a fool. In some things it was plain enough
that he was a fool, but he certainly did not
know it. He was in the “deadest” earnest
in these matters. He died at sea,
last summer, as the “Earl of Ramsgate.”
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