University of Virginia Library

3. III.
Description of Mrs. Solomon Fudge.

MRS. FUDGE is of the family of Bodgers, of
Newtown. It is by no means a low family.
Her father was Squire Bodgers, a deserving, stout
man, rather bluff in his habit of speech, but “fore-handed,”
and quite a column in the Baptist Church
of Newtown. Indeed, the only serious quarrel which
ever occurred between my Aunt Phœbe and the
Squire, was in relation to church-matters. Mrs.
Fudge, after ten years' residence in town, ventured
to change her faith—simultaneously with her change
of residence from Wooster street to the Avenue.
From having been an exemplary Baptist, she

became, on a sudden, an unexceptional high-church
listener, with prayer-books and velvets to match.

Mr. Bodgers, of Newtown, was indignant, and
came to the city on a visit of expostulation. My
Aunt Phœbe tried reasoning, but the Squire was
too strong for her. She next tried tears, but tears
were unavailing. She urged the wishes and the
position of her husband, Mr. Fudge; to all which
I have no doubt that Mr. Bodgers replied, in his
bluff way, “Fudge be d—d!” I do not, however,
affirm it.

The result may be easily anticipated. Mrs. Fudge
continued firm in her new connection; reading the
service at first with a good deal of snappish zeal,
and at length subsiding into an eligible pew and
place, where her furs would meet with observation,
and her complexion catch a becoming light from the
transept window. Mr. Bodgers threatened to cut
her off from all share in his country estate; and, to
give color to the threat, brought about a reconciliation
with his second daughter, Kitty, who had married,
eight years before, very much against his
wishes, a poor country clergyman.

How and where the courtship first came about
which ultimately metamorphosed the plump and
comely Phœbe Bodgers into the exemplary Mrs.
Solomon Fudge, it seems hardly worth while to narrate.

It is sufficient to say, that the wife of Squire
Bodgers was a shrewd woman and capital manager.
Solomon Fudge was a disinterested young man, of
eligible family, pleasant prospects in the way of
trade. He wore, judging from an old portrait which
ornamented the back-parlor in Wooster street, and
which hangs in the basement upon the Avenue,
the tight pantaloons which were in vogue at that
date, and a considerable weight of metal to his fob-chain.

Numerous incidents in regard to the courtship
have leaked out, from time to time, when I have
found my aunt in a sentimental humor; but as they
appear to be mostly of that ordinary and commonplace
character which are found in novels, and have
little of the spice of real life about them, I do not
think it worth my while to write them down. A
little sonnet, however, in acrostic form, in which
Phœbe Bodgers figures as Diana, has gratified me
as an evidence of considerable poetic taste on the
part of the present bank-officer; and I need hardly
say, that the same is carefully guarded by Mrs.
Solomon Fudge.

Squire Bodgers, I regret to say, is now dead; so
is his wife. Mrs. Fudge, though fat and healthy, is
an orphan. She cherishes, I regret farther to say,
but a slight recollection of the surviving members

of the family. The old gentleman, in dying, was as
good as his word, and left but little of his small
property to the town-branch. The homestead
reverted to Mrs. Kitty Fleming, the widow of the
poor clergyman already mentioned, who died, leaving
one child, bearing the mother's name and a fair
share of country beauty. I have met with her on
a random visit to Newtown in the summer season.
She is just turned of sixteen. I am not aware that
she speaks a word of French; yet I must confess
that I admire her exceedingly—much more than her
aunt.

Mrs. Solomon Fudge does not fancy Newtown
as a summer residence; she rarely alludes to the
place; nor does she often speak of her country
cousins. They paid her frequent visits while she
was living in Wooster street; I observe that they
have since fallen off. When they come, however,
she is familiar and easy with them—in the basement.
I do not remember that she ever gave a party for
them.

One stout, fussy old gentleman, who has been a
thriving shop-keeper in her native township, annoys
her excessively. Upon the strength of a very remote
cousinship, he insists upon addressing her as “Cousin
Phœbe;” and this notwithstanding he wears a
long surtout and a prodigious red-and-yellow silk

pocket-handkerchief. His name is Bodgers—Truman
Bodgers, Esquire. He has been in the State
Legislature, and did a great deal for the tanning-interest
of the county, in which he is himself largely
interested.

From some hints that have been now and then
dropped, I incline to the opinion that Mrs. Fudge
was an old flame of his: it is certain that he keeps
up a moderate show of attention to this day. He
is one of those genuine, rough-bred country Americans
who are not to be pricked through with any
stings of fashionable observance. He counts his
Cousin Phœbe no better in her home upon the Avenue
than when she played bare-footed at the old
husking-frolics of Newtown. And with a straight-forward
native instinct, he acts out his impressions
in plain country fashion.

I must say that I rather admire Mr. Bodgers,
notwithstanding my aunt's ungracious sneers; and
I admire him all the more for the wholesome contrast
that he offers to my poor aunt's city weaknesses.
Next to her dread of his coming, I think
that she manifests a decided reluctance to my meeting
with him at her house. The consequence is, as
I am an amiable man and have much spare time on
my hands, I almost always contrive to call whenever
I catch a glimpse of the long surtout; and

enjoy exceedingly the rubicund countenance of friend
Truman, and the slightly vinegared aspect of Mrs.
Solomon Fudge.

I think I have dwelt long enough upon the antecedents
of Mrs. Fudge; I shall therefore go on to
speak of her present home, character, and position.

She is an exemplary woman; at least, this is the
style in which her clergyman, the Reverend Doctor
Muddleton, uniformly speaks of her. I observe,
however, that he speaks in the same way of a great
many others among his lady parishioners, who rent
very high-priced pews, and subscribe in a fair sum
to his pet charities. It is, upon the whole, a discreet
way of speaking. Dr. Muddleton is a discreet
man.

My aunt, then, is an exemplary woman: what
the Doctor means by it, I could never precisely
understand. She is certainly an example of apparent
good health, and of fair preservation; in point
of size, too, as I have already remarked, she is
quite noticeable. She does not believe in unnecessary
fatigue of any sort. The world wags very
quietly with her, and she sees no reason why it
should not wag very quietly with everybody else.

She is methodical and judicious in her charities:
she suffers her name to appear in the public prints—
although a great trial to her natural delicacy—as

one of the managers of the Society for the Relief of
Indigent Females: she makes a small yearly contribution
to the same. She gives her maids several
old silk dresses in the course of the year, and
supplies her cook with cast-off under-clothes. She
presents her coachman every Christmas-day with a
half-eagle; and on one occasion, when he wished
“A 'appy New-Year, and many of 'em, to the hiligant
Mrs. Fudge,” she extended her charity to a
cast-off over-coat of her husband's.

She does not allow match-girls, and that sort of
vulgar people, to be begging about the basement
windows. She rather prides herself upon the dignified
and peremptory way with which she orders
them off; it certainly is not apt to provoke a
return.

Her house is after the usual city pattern—two
parlors, with folding-doors; one furnished with blue,
the other with crimson. Two arm-chairs to each, of
rosewood, very luxuriously upholstered. Straight-backed
chairs, with crewel-worked bottoms and
backs; one or two of these. A screen similarly
worked, one of Peyser's best. Ottoman, similarly
worked; a red-and-white puppy, in crewel. Alabaster
vases, from Leeds' auction, “quite recherché
in form,” as Mr. Leeds remarked at the time of
sale. Candelabras, of fashionable pattern, from

Woram and Haughwout—“a splendid article.”
Tapestry carpets, very soft, arabesque pattern,
quite showy, and, according to the Messrs. Tinson,
“remarkably chaste.” Curtains, to match furniture,
very heavy cord and tassel, draped under the
eye of Mrs. Fudge, by a middle-aged man, of
“great taste.”

There are paintings on the wall, very strongly
admired by Mr. Bodgers, and country cousins generally.
They were imported at immense expense,
but purchased by Mrs. Fudge at a bargain. A
dining-room skirts the two parlors in the rear.
This arrangement of the house is not original with
Mrs. Fudge; several city houses are built in a
somewhat similar manner. I do not know that
this arrangement suits Mrs. Fudge's convenience
and family better than any other; I do not think,
indeed, that she ever asked herself the question.
It is the style; and my aunt has a great abhorrence
of anything that is not “the style.”

Mrs. Fudge has at her command a coachman and
footman. The first sticks to the stable; the second
does duty in-doors—cleans the silver, waits on the
table, and receives visitors. On ordinary days he
wears a white apron; but on great occasions he is
ornamented with a blue coat and Berlin gloves.
Mrs. Fudge supplies him with soap and shaving

materials. She ventured at one time, after reading
Cecil, into powdering his hair. Mr. Bodgers mistook
him for Mr. Fudge. I came near falling into
the same mistake myself. She has abandoned the
powder.

If I were to call Mrs. Fudge a fashionable lady,
I should do violence to her prejudices, at the same
time that I should gratify her affectionate impulses.
I have not so much fear of her violence as I have
love for her gratification. I therefore say unhesitatingly,
Mrs. Fudge is a fashionable woman.

“Tony,” she will say, “you know better. You
know that I scorn fashion; you have heard me do it
again and again. You know I have a perfect
contempt for all the extravagances of fashion.”

“Quite as you say, Mrs. Fudge,” I should reply,
blandly.

“Why then do you call me fashionable, Tony?”
(quite mildly, and with a felicitous tweak of her
cap-strings, followed by a careless yet effective
adjustment of the folds of a very showy brocade
dress).

“I was doubtless wrong, Aunt Phœbe. It was
a mistake of mine. You are not a fashionable
woman.”

The face of Mrs. Fudge falls. She thanks me
very sourly, and she insists upon knowing what

conceivable reason should have suggested such an
idea.

In an ugly humor—we will say after one of the
cold breakfasts of the down-town hotels—I should
reply, “None at all;” thereby gratifying my aunt's
moral sentiment, and making her my enemy for ten
days to come. I know better than this; a man
does not live for twenty years about town for
nothing. My reply would be, therefore, very different.
“Reasons enough, Mrs. Fudge. You employ
a fashionable hair-dresser; you trade only at fashionable
shops; you wear the most becoming and
fashionable colors (imagine Aunt Phœbe's glow);
you drive at a fashionable hour; your furniture is
fashionable; and the names in your card-basket are
fashionable names.”

This last assertion (the only really questionable
one of the whole) she admits as strong evidence
against her. But how on earth can she refuse the
visits of such persons as will come?

“How, to be sure?”

Mrs. Fudge is all smiles. She will not listen to
my talk of leaving. She will speak of me (I know
she will) all the week as that dear, delightful fellow,
Tony.

There is a large swarm of persons upon the town
—heads of families and others—who without being

fashionable themselves, are very earnest but very
silent admirers of what they think fashionable society.
They are, I observe also, very indefatigable
in their raillery of fashionable follies, and in their
expressions of contempt. They follow after the
camp with very much show of mirth, and with a
great deal of eagerness to catch up a cast-away
feather or a cockade. They rail at what is out of
their reach, and have not the apology of refinement
to give a zest to their cravings.

Having whipped my chapter upon Mrs. Fudge
into this smack of a moral, I shall close it here.