Caudle

“ All I say is this; never again do I open my lips to you about anybody. No: if man and wife can't be one, why there's an end of everything. Oh, you know well what I mean, Mr. Caudle: you've broken my confidence in the most shameful, the most heartless way, and I repeat it—I can never be again to you as I have been. No: the little charm—it wasn't much—that remained about married life, is gone for ever. Yes; the bloom's quite wiped off the plum now. "Don't be such a hypocrite, Caudle; don't ask me what I mean! Mrs. Badgerly has been here—more like a fiend, I'm sure, than a quiet woman. ”

“ I knew what it would come to when you were made a mason: when you were once made a 'brother,' as you call yourself, I knew where the husband and father would be;—I'm sure, Caudle, and though I'm your own wife, I grieve to say it—I'm sure you haven't so much heart that you have any to spare for people out of doors. Indeed, I should like to see the man who has! No, no, Caudle; I'm by no means a selfish woman—quite the contrary; I love my fellow-creatures as a wife and mother of a family, who has only to look to her own husband and children, ought to love 'em. ”

“ Now, it's no use, Caudle, your telling me that you have only been once, and that you can't hit a ball anyhow—you'll soon get over all that; and then you'll never be at home. You'll be a marked man, Caudle; yes, marked: there'll be something about you that'll be dreadful; for if I couldn't tell a billiard-player by his looks, I've no eyes, that's all. They all of 'em look as yellow as parchment, and wear mustachios—I suppose you'll let yours grow now; though they'll be a good deal troubled to come. ”

“ I'd make a law against any of 'em having wives, except upon paper; for goodness help the dear creatures tied to them! Like innocent moths lured by a candle! Talking of candles, you don't know that the lamp in the passage is split to bits! I say you don't—do you hear me, Mr. Caudle? Won't you answer? Do you know where you are? What?
"In the Garden of Eden?
"Are you? Then you've no business there at this time of night."
"And saying this," writes Caudle, "she scrambled from the bed and put out the light." ”

“ That was my death, Caudle, though don't let that make you uneasy, love; for I don't think you meant to do it.
"Ha! it's all very well for you to call it nonsense; and to lay your ill conduct upon my shoes. That's like a man, exactly! There never was a man yet that killed his wife, who couldn't give a good reason for it. ”

“ Caudle, goodness knows! and when I do, I'm always refused—of course. Oh yes! anybody but your own lawful wife. Every other husband aboard the boat could behave like a husband—but I was left to shift for myself. To be sure, that's nothing new; I always am. Every other man, worthy to be called a man, could smuggle a few things for his wife—but I might as well be alone in the world. Not one poor half-dozen of silk stockings could you put in your hat for me; and everybody else was rolled in lace, and I don't know what. Eh? What, Mr. Caudle? "What do I want with silk stockings? ”

“ Caudle? A good deal of it, sir. Nice crowding and squeezing in those shows, I know. Pretty places! And you a married man and the father of a family. No: I won't hold my tongue. It's very well for you to threaten to get up. You're to go to Greenwich Fair, and race up and down the hill, and play at kiss in the ring. Pah! it's disgusting, Mr. Caudle. ”

“ Dear me! if the bed doesn't spin round and dance about! I've got all that filthy ship in my head! No: I sha'n't be well in the morning. But nothing ever ails anybody but yourself. You needn't groan in that way, Mr. Caudle, disturbing the people, perhaps, in the next room. It's a mercy I'm alive, I'm sure. If once I wouldn't have given all the world for anybody to have thrown me overboard! What are you smacking your lips at, Mr. Caudle? But I know what you mean—of course, you'd never have stirred to stop 'em; not you. ”

“ But I'm a fool to trouble my head about you.
“And you're not going to let me know the secret, eh? You mean to say,—you're not? Now, Caudle, you know it's a hard matter to put me in a passion—not that I care about the secret itself: no, I wouldn't give a button to know it, for it's all nonsense, I'm sure. It isn't the secret I care about: it's the slight, Mr. Caudle; it's the studied insult that a man pays to his wife, when he thinks of going through the world keeping something to himself which he won't let her know. Man and wife one, indeed! ”

“ Mind, Caudle, I'm not saying anything against her; not at all; but there's a flightiness in her manner—I dare say, poor thing, she means no harm, and it may be, as the saying is, only her manner after all—still, there is a flightiness about her that, after what you've been used to, would make you very wretched. Now, if I may boast of anything, Caudle, it is my propriety of manner the whole of my life. I know that wives who're very particular aren't thought as well of as those who're not—still, it's next to nothing to be virtuous, if people don't seem so. ”

“ Caudle, your calling me a good creature: I'm not such a fool as to be coaxed in that way. No: if you want to go to sleep, you should come home in Christian time, not at halfpast twelve. There was a time, when you were as regular at your fireside as the kettle. That was when you were a decent man, and didn't go amongst, Heaven knows who, drinking and smoking, and making what you think your jokes. I never heard any good come to a man who cared about jokes. No respectable tradesman does. But I know what I'll do: I'll scare away your Skylarks. ”

“ Nobody cries out more about clean linen than you do—and nobody leads a poor woman so miserable a life when she tries to make her husband comfortable. Yes, Mr. Caudle—comfortable! You needn't keep chewing the word, as if you couldn't swallow it. "Was there ever such a woman?
"No, Caudle; I hope not: I should hope no other wife was ever put upon as I am! It's all very well for you. I can't have a little wash at home like anybody else but you must go about the house swearing to yourself, and looking at your wife as if she was your bitterest enemy. ”

“ I shouldn't wonder if I caught my death; yes; and that's what you lent the umbrella for. Of course!
"Nice clothes I shall get too, trapesing through weather like this. My gown and bonnet will be spoilt quite. Needn't I wear 'em, then? Indeed, Mr. Caudle, I shall wear 'em. No, sir, I'm not going out a dowdy to please you or anybody else. Gracious knows! it isn't often that I step over the threshold; indeed, I might as well be a slave at once,—better, I should say. But when I do go out, Mr. Caudle, I choose to go like a lady. Oh! ”

“ As might have been anticipated, one of the speakers touched upon the highly-popular Curtain Lectures, and in the course of his nervously brief reply Douglas Jerrold said:—"Mrs. Caudle! Your honourable member has said he does not believe there is a Mrs. Caudle in all Birmingham. I will even venture to go further than he: I do not think there is a Mrs. Caudle in the whole world. I really think the whole matter is a fiction—a wicked fiction, intended merely to throw into finer contrast the trustingness, the beauty, the confidence, and the taciturnity of the sex." ”

“ At your time——”
“Here,” says Caudle, “I dozed off, hearing confusedly the words—hill—gypsies—rattles—roundabout—swings—pink bonnet—nuts.”
LECTURE X. ON MR. CAUDLE'S SHIRT-BUTTONS. THERE, Mr. Caudle, I hope you 're in a little better temper than you were this morning? There—you needn't begin to whistle: people don't come to bed to whistle. But it's like you. I can't speak, that you don't try to insult me. Once, I used to say, you were the best creature living: now, you get quite a fiend. Do let you rest? No: I won't let you rest. ”

“ We will not go so far as to admit the truth of the hint which the author lets fall as to every woman having in her a drop of the Caudle—it might be unsafe to do so, even if it were not contrary to experience. Still I am credibly informed that there is no fear of the race dying out—from some Job Caudles of the day I have gathered as much. This being so, there can be no apology necessary for adding yet another to the many editions of the Lectures which have been used up since they appeared week by week in the pages of Punch for the entertainment of our grandparents. ”

“ And of course they only laugh at you. 'Caudle's an easy fool,' they cry—I know it as well as if I heard 'em—'Caudle's an easy fool; anybody may lead him.' Yes; anybody but his own wife;—and she—of course—is nobody. "And now, everybody that's arrested will of course send to you. Yes, Mr. Caudle, you'll have your hands full now, no doubt of it. You'll soon know every sponging-house and every sheriff's officer in London. Your business will have to take care of itself; you'll have enough to do to run from lawyer to lawyer after the business of other people. ”

“ Caudle? A book? What!
"If you aren't allowed to sleep, you'll read?
"Well, now it is come to something! If that isn't insulting a wife to bring a book to bed, I don't know what wedlock is. But you sha'n't read, Caudle; no, you sha'n't; not while I've strength to get up and put out a candle.
"And that's like your feelings! You can think a great deal of trumpery books; yes, you can't think too much of the stuff that's put into print; but for what's real and true about you, why, you've the heart of a stone. ”

“ Mr. Caudle, you don't know what you talked that day—but I do. Yes; and you then sat at the table as if your face, as I may say, was buttered with happiness, and—What? No, Mr. Caudle, don't say that; I have not wiped the butter off—not I. If you above all men are not happy, you ought to be, gracious knows!
"Yes, I will talk of fourteen years ago. Ha! ”

“ Now, it's no use your talking; all I say is this, Caudle: if you send a man to put on any lock here, I'll call in a policeman; as I'm your married wife, I will.
"No, I think when a man comes to have the street-door key, the sooner he turns bachelor altogether the better. ”

“ I saw you when the creature was just behind my chair; you took up a glass of wine, and saying to me, 'Margaret,' and then lifting up your eyes at the bold minx, and saying 'my dear,' as if you wanted me to believe that you spoke only to me, when I could see you laugh at her behind me. And at that time little Jack wasn't on his feet. What do you say?
"YOU NODDED AND DRANK A GLASS OF WINE TO THAT CREATURE."
"Heaven forgive me?
"Ha! Mr. Caudle, it's you that ought to ask for that: I'm safe enough, I am: it's you who should ask to be forgiven. ”

“ Caudle still lives—and will live as long as her sex; therefore, England and America still chuckle.
You ought to be very rich, Mr. Caudle. I wonder who'd lend you five pounds! But so it is: a wife may work and slave. Oh, dear! the many things that might have been done with five pounds! As if people picked up money in the streets! But you always were a fool, Mr. Caudle! I've wanted a black satin gown these three years, and that five pounds would have pretty well bought it. But it's no matter how I go—not at all. Everybody says I don't dress as becomes your wife—and I don't ”

“ He's plenty of money, Caudle; and I think he might be got. Babies, I know it—babies are his weak side. Wouldn't it be a blessed thing to find our dear child in his will? Why don't you speak? I declare, Caudle, you seem to care no more for the child than if it was a stranger's. People who can't love children more than you do, ought never to have 'em.
"You don't like Wagstaff?
"No more do I much; but what's that to do with it? People who've their families to provide for, mustn't think of their feelings. I don't like him; but then I'm a mother, and love my baby. ”

“ Ha! that's like you—always giving people a bad name. We mustn't always believe what the world says, Caudle; it doesn't become us as Christians to do it. I only know that he hasn't chick or child; and, besides that, he's very strong interest in the Blue-coats; and so, if Pugsby——Now, don't fly out at the man in that manner. Caudle, you ought to be ashamed of yourself! You can't speak well of anybody. ”

“ Yes, it's very well for you to lie there and laugh; it's easy to laugh, Caudle—very easy, to people who don't feel. "Now, Caudle, dear! What a man you are! I know you'll give me the money, because, after all, I think you love your children, and like to see 'em well dressed. It's only natural that a father should. Eh, Caudle, eh? ”

“ I'm not made happy by the blacks, and they don't prolong my enjoyment; and, more than that, you're an unfeeling man to say so. You're enough to make a woman wish herself in her grave—you are, Caudle.
"And a pretty example you set to your sons! Because we'd a little wash to-day, and there wasn't a hot dinner—and who thinks of getting anything hot for washer-women?—because you hadn't everything as you always have it, you must swear at the cold mutton—and you don't know what that mutton costs a pound, I dare say—you must swear at a sweet, wholesome joint like a lord. ”

“ Caudle; for I'm sure she's little blessed by you. She's been kept a prisoner all her life—has never gone anywhere—oh yes! that's your old excuse,—talking of the children. I want to go to France, and I should like to know what the children have to do with it? They're not babies now—are they? But you've always thrown the children in my face. If Miss Prettyman—there now ”