Bunce

“ McGlory snorted contemptuously and put his tongue in his cheek. Bunce began fingering his knife lanyard.
"No more of that give-and-take," said Matt.
"I'm a hard man," observed Bunce, "an' I've lived a hard life, winnin' my mate's berth on the ole Hottentot off Trincomalee by bashing in the skull of a Kanaka. More things I've done as would make your blood run cold just by listenin' to, but I'm straight as a forestay for all that, d'ye mind, an' I've a clean bill from every master I ever sailed with. ”

“ Bunce had grown tired of peddling—the [415] trade was not less uncertain than fatiguing. Besides, travelling so much among the southrons, he had imbibed not a few of their prejudices against his vocation, and, to speak the truth, had grown somewhat ashamed of his present mode of life. He was becoming rapidly aristocratic, as we may infer from a very paternal and somewhat patronizing epistle, which he despatched about this time to his elder brother and copartner, Ichabod Bunce, who carried on his portion of the business at their native place in Meriden, Connecticut. ”

“ Let me whisper a word, Master Harry—a beautiful joke—it was Bridget—
LIEUTENANT ELSWORTH. No, sir, it was Rose herself.
CLEVELAND. The young man is right.
ELSWORTH. How! What do you say?
CLEVELAND. Simply, sir, by the richest scheme in the world, this rebel's union with your daughter is rendered impossible. I told you the marriage was a jest—a sham. It was not—quite the contrary.
ELSWORTH. Do I understand you to say, sir, that you have really tricked Captain Armstrong into a marriage with—
CLEVELAND. To be sure, sir. It will be the sport of the whole army. ”

“ ROSE. Do they know your person?
ARMSTRONG. From description, probably.
ROSE. We must conceal you, then.
ARMSTRONG. If you've a rat hole into which you can crowd me.
HARRY. I must be ignorant of your movements. I will go and receive them. [Exit.
ARMSTRONG. Whose command is it?
ROSE. Major Cleveland's.
ARMSTRONG. Eh? The man of men who itches to get hold of my insignificant person. He has offered £50 for it.
KATE. [At the window.] Away! They are dismounting at the door.
ROSE. You, Bridget—I can trust you—quick, to the loft with him. ”

“ Margaret Bunce, a lean, dirty, slatternly matron, apparently between fifty and sixty years old, complained that she had been grossly assaulted by Miss Eliza Pritchard and Miss Hannah Maria Bagwell—a pair of little stunted damsels from the back settlements of Drury-lane; who, according to their own account, maintain themselves "very cumfuttably by going a charrin."
"Please your worship," said Mrs. Bunce, "I lives in Short's Gardens, and these ladies lives in Charles-street, and I can get no comfort for 'em night nor day. They'm always at me for everlasting, go out when I will ”

“ During this speech ARMSTRONG glides in behind, among the shrubbery, and touches ROSE. ROSE starts, and slightly screams. All turn quickly toward her. She, hastily and unseen, unclasps a bracelet from her arm, and flings it behind her.
ROSE. Gentlemen! gentlemen! gentlemen! I've lost my bracelet—a valued bracelet. Five minutes ago I had it on my arm. Major Cleveland—Captain Arbald—I beseech you to search for it. What could have become of it?
CLEVELAND. Your bracelet?
ROSE. Gentlemen, I implore you to search for it. Major, it may have been dropped in the bower. Go look for it, sir. ”

“ So she filled her apron with sand, and ran down to the sea-side. But a hole came in the apron, and the sand which ran out formed a hill at Sagard. The giant maiden said, "Ah! now my mother will scold me!" Then she stopped the hole with her hand and ran on again. But the giant mother looked over the wood, and cried, "You nasty child! what are you about? Come here, and you'll get a good whipping." The daughter in a fright let go her apron, and all the sand ran out, and made the barren hills near Litzow, which the white and brown dwarfs took for their dwelling-place. ”

“ ROSE. That's the point of the joke, eh?
CLEVELAND. Come, will you do it?
ROSE. Well—I am doubtful.
CLEVELAND. Only carry it out well, and you shall have fifty pounds.
ROSE. I am convinced, as old intrigues are dull, I want pastime, and would like to earn fifty pounds, and if my chances in other quarters are uninjured, why—
CLEVELAND. You will do it?
ROSE. Will the Captain think it a jest?
CLEVELAND. He thinks there is a plan on foot to introduce your mistress to him for a similar purpose.
ROSE. And when he finds that he has married plain Bridget instead of
Miss Rose—what a rage he will be in! ”

“ They are good soldiers, and fine-looking fellows.
ROSE. For which I thank their tailors.
CLEVELAND. Gay, dashing; brave of heart, and witty of tongue.
ROSE. Then they have been studying the almanac. When I saw them last, they hadn't a grain of wit—not even by scratching.
CLEVELAND. Really, Mr. Elsworth, your daughter has a sharp tongue.
ELSWORTH. It is her humour, sir. Her passes are but play.
CLEVELAND. I'll be sworn her heart is as true as her wit. She is—
ROSE. Rebel, sir, from top to toe!
[Enter ARBALD, MARVIN, and HARRY.]
Ah, gentlemen, my best welcome. ”

“ METCALF. I wonder where Bridget is. I'll pop the question before morning.
ELSWORTH. Rose, you have neglected your friends. Let us go in.
ROSE. Our first duty is to the friends before us—
WALTER. To which faction do they adhere—red or blue?
ROSE. True blue and rebel, I'll be sworn—but I will ask them! [Comes forward. To ARMSTRONG.] You see, sir, they respond already. [To the Audience.] Do you approve the Whiggish maid, and sanction her schemes so boldly played? The heart of love is heroic in every age ”

“ But I have a brother who is an English officer; a husband who is an American one. Be careful, sir, in what way you use my name in connection with this night's work, for, be assured, they will not fail to punish a ribald, a slanderous, or a libertine tongue. Consent to Captain Armstrong's release, and your discomfiture remains a secret; refuse, and with one word, I'll have all our guests upon the spot and a public confession.
CLEVELAND. It's absurd to suppose that I'm to be bound by such figments as you have woven. ”

“ In crossing the river a dead hand would stretch itself up to her, and a dead face, like that of her father, would appear, and a voice would issue from the dead man's mouth, begging for the other piece of money, that he might pay for his passage, and get released from the doom of floating for ever in the grim flood of Styx. ”

“ Mr. Harding walked on, and shook his head impatiently. Poor Bunce little knew how he was tormenting his patron.
"If there was anything to cheer you, I should be so glad to know it," said he, with a tone of affection which the warden in all his misery could not resist.
He stopped, and took both the old man's hands in his. "My friend," said he, "my dear old friend, there is nothing: there is no news to cheer me—God's will be done:" and two small hot tears broke away from his eyes and stole down his furrowed cheeks. ”

“ The third time the King sent his trusty servant, who was very civil, and asked the bellows-blower to wash himself, and he did so, and the eagle brought a gold and silver dress that had belonged to the biggest giant, and when the King opened the coach door there was sitting inside the very finest man he ever saw. And the young man told the King all that had happened, and they gave him the King's eldest daughter for his wife, and the wedding lasted twenty days and twenty nights. ”

“ Nobody in the walks—the marriage not over yet—bless me! I do believe that I am trembling like a refractory scholar with a prospective birching. If it should fail—but it won't, it can't—Rose is a girl to carry anything through.
Re-enter MR. ELSWORTH.
ELSWORTH. Where can Rose be, I wonder! I can't find her anywhere. Everybody inquiring for her—everybody laughing too about the jest upon Armstrong. Ah, these military fellows are such practical jokers—so full of deviltry, to be sure! Who could have thought of such a trick?
METCALF. No civilian, you may be sure, sir. [Aside, looking off.] Eh? ”

“ The shoemaker had to finish some shoes because the young King was going to be married; and the maiden said she should like to see the King before he married. So the shoemaker took her to the King's castle; and then she went into the wedding-room, and because of her beauty they filled a vessel of wine for her. When she was going to drink it, there came a flame out of the glass, and out of the flame there came a silver pigeon and a golden pigeon; and just then three grains of barley fell upon the floor, and the silver pigeon ate them up. ”

“ I said in pretended dismay,
"I have no money to pay this bill, the man can go away;"
"But, sahib," said Buncee quickly, "there are my rupees, you know."
Do you wonder I liked the youngster, or that I valued him so?
And oft in the gloaming I sit and think, and memory backward flies;
For many there be with hearts as true in that land under Eastern skies.
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GLOSSARY
No. ”

“ It was not based on the poem by Fitz-Greene Halleck, but, for its colour and plot, Bunce went direct to history. For Wallack he also wrote a tragedy, entitled "Fate; or, The Prophecy," and, according to Hutton, during the summer of 1848, the Denin Sisters produced his "Morning of Life," at the New York Chatham Theatre.
Such was the extent of Bunce's drama writing. His life was not cast in the dramatic field, but rather in the publishing world. The plays were done in his early manhood. ”

“ So it happened, and the King's son chose the youngest daughter, because she put out her hand to guide him.
Then they were married, and there was a great feast, and they went to their chamber. The Giant's daughter said to her husband, "Sleep not, or thou diest; we must fly quick, or my father will kill thee." So first she cut an apple into nine pieces, and put two pieces at the head of the bed, and two at the foot, and two at the door of the kitchen, and two at the great door, and one outside the house. ”

“ In The Galaxy for February, 1868, Bunce ventures to survey "Some of Our Actors" from the standpoint of deploring the pre-Raphaelite realism of the modern school. He scored the attempted "truth" and "fidelity" of Matilda Heron, and, in considering Maggie Mitchell's Fanchon, he bespoke the cause of ideality, as necessary in Fanchon as in Juliet. "Modern comedy acting," he declares, "is usually a bright, brisk touch-and-go affair, suited to modern plays; but to the mellow and artistic style of a former generation, it is as the light claret wines, now so much in use, to crusty old port." ”

“ And to water it well is now their pride;
When the sahibs drive there in the cool of the day.
They see them at work in the old-time way.
—————
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A little hill-boy was Buncee, a chokra trusty and true ”

“ Well, this went on for some time, and the wife of the White Bear was very happy with her kind husband, in the beautiful palace he had made for her. Then she grew dull and miserable for want of company, and she asked leave to go home for a little while to see her father and mother, and her brothers and sisters. So the White Bear took her home again, but he told her that there was one thing she must not do; she must not go into a room with her mother alone, to talk to her, or a great misfortune would happen. ”

“ Now this is Fairy Land, the dear sweet land of Once Upon a Time, where there is constant light, and summer days, and everlasting flowers, and pleasant fields and streams, and long dreams without rough waking, and ease of life, and all things strange and beautiful; where nobody wonders at anything that may happen; where good fairies are ever on the watch to help those whom they love ”

“ Here is clearly a Sun-myth, which is like those of ancient Hindu and Greek legend: the blue-grey Filly is the Dawn, on which the new day, the maiden and her lover, speed away. The great Giant, whose breath burns the maiden's back, is the morning Sun, whose progress is stopped by the thick shade of the trees. Then he rises higher, and at midday he breaks through the forest, and soars above the rocky mountains. At evening, still powerful in speed and heat, he comes to the great lake, plunges into it, and sets, and those whom he pursues escape. ”

“ Nay, she knows there is a jubilant lilt in her voice as it joins the strange voice and sings:
"Happy the heart where graces reign.
Where love inspires the breast;
Love is the brightest of the train,
And strengthens all the rest."
Her father turned half around where he stood, as a pillar of the church turning on its base, and gazed at the stranger. Prudence could not turn; she could only glance shyly at her father. He had his Sunday face on, and she knew that he would not relax a muscle of it until he had shaken hands with the Dominie in the porch. ”

“ Jack the Giant Killer is the Wind and the Light which disperses the mists and overthrows the cloud giants; and popular fancy, ages ago, dressed him out as a person combating real giants of flesh and blood, just as in all ages and all countries the forces of nature have taken personal shape, and have given us these tales of miraculous gifts, of great deeds done, and of monsters destroyed by men with the courage and the strength of heroes. ”

“ So Aphrodite sent for her son Eros, the God of Love, and took him to the city where Psyche lived, and showed the maiden to him, and bade him afflict her with love for a man who should be the most wicked and most miserable of mankind, an outcast, a beggar, one who had done some great wrong, and had fallen so low that no man in the whole world could be so wretched. ”

“ If he likes work, there is plenty of adventure; he can climb up mountains of steel, or travel over seas of glass, or engage in single combat with a giant, or dive down into the caves of the little red dwarfs and bring up their hidden treasures, or mount a horse that goes more swiftly than the wind, or go off on a long journey to find the water of youth and life, or do anything else that happens to be very dangerous and troublesome. ”