Tommy Smith

“ One ought always to be modest when one makes a speech. And now (the owl said) he was quite sure that Tommy Smith would never be unkind to animals any more as long as he lived, because, just before he flew away, he had asked him to promise that he wouldn’t. But Tommy Smith had just gone off to sleep then, and so he had had to promise it in his sleep. “And, you know,” said the owl, “that when a promise is made in that way, it is always kept.” Then all the animals clapped their—well, whatever they could clap, and said “Hurrah!” ”

“ And the more Tommy Smith learnt about them, the more he liked them, until the animals became his very best friends. Of course, one is never unkind to one’s very best friends, and, besides, Tommy Smith had given the owl a promise—in his sleep. ”

“ Thompson had succeeded in piquing her curiosity, Persis drew the enclosure from the envelope and for an instant studied the monogram at the head of the sheet. When her gaze dropped to the address, her eyebrows lifted.
"Yes, I know," murmured young Mr. Thompson. "'Tommy darling.' Tommy is short for Thompson, I suppose. Tommy-rot, I call it. You might read it aloud if you don't mind. It'll help me to have a realization of what I'm up against." ”

“ Then he might go to work at things he understood. There was a funeral at seven; old Mrs. Harrow at the Home wanted to see him; and David Sterling had half promised to help him with St. Agnes's Mission School, and must be encouraged; a man in the worst tenement of the south city had raided his wife with a knife and there was trouble, physical and moral, and he must see to that; also Tommy Smith was dying at the Tuberculosis Hospital and had clung to his hands yesterday, and would not let him go—he must manage to get to little Tommy to-night. ”

“ But we have another way which is cleverer still, and as there is a basket of eggs in that cupboard there, I don’t mind showing it you; for, between ourselves, when we do that trick, we like to have a little boy in the kitchen at nights to look at us. But, first, I must call a friend of mine.” The rat then gave rather a loud squeak, and out another rat came running; but Tommy Smith didn’t see where it came from. ”

“ He let his gaze wander round the room until it fell upon the face of his master, and then, under some impulse, he wrote the fateful words, "Mr. Smith is a man."
"Finish off now!" rang out the command from Mr. Smith.
Tommy saw the other boys putting sheet after sheet together, and he had hardly filled one. He racked his brains for something to add to his essay, and there came to his mind the words written under his father's portrait. He had only time to put down "England expecs—" when his paper was collected.
No one ever read Tommy Brown's essay excepting Mr. Smith, and he burnt it. ”

“ Rook,” he said, “do let me go with you.” But the rook said, “Oh no! that would never do. No men are allowed at our trials. There are no rooks at yours, you know.”
“No,” said Tommy Smith; “but that is because”—
“Never mind why it is,” interrupted the rook; “no doubt there is some good reason, and we have our reasons too. We could not try a rook properly if we thought a man was watching us. It would make us nervous. Sometimes (but not very often) a man has watched us without our knowing it, and then he has told everybody about our wonderful [37] trials. But people have not believed him ”

“ For it is certain he had a pride of the most incredible, which I daresay made him a little hard to manage; and yet in his heart there was a softness.
"'That Tommy,' said his mother, 'he wants to be loved. That is the way to get him to do anything. There is no use in always punishing him and treating him hardly.'
"But for all that, old Siméon must have his will, and so he does not cease to be scolding the boy. He [Pg 47] commands him now to do this thing, now that—here, there. He forbids him to be from home at night. He tells him he is a disgrace of a son to be so little laborious. ”

“ The large ones are like rich people who can afford to hire a whole band, but the little ones and the bushes are the people who are not so well off, and they can only have a bird or two.” Tommy Smith thought all this, because he was a little boy, and liked to pretend things, but a long time afterwards, when he was much wiser, he used to remember those walks of his in the woods, and sometimes he would say to himself, “Yes, those were the best seasons ”

“ But wan day, whin his mother was thryin' an a velvet sack he bought for her, an' fightin' him bekase there was no fur collar to id, in walked his wife an' three childher to him an' her, an' shtayed wid her ever afther. Begob, she never said another word about fur collars, an' she never [56] got another velvet sack till she died. Tommy had money, enough to kape them all decent, bud not enough for velvet and silk an' joolry. From that minnit he got back his tongue, an' he talked himself almost to death about what he didn't do, an' what he did do in Californy. ”

“ Tommy Brown has already been in disgrace, although it is only a fortnight since he wrote the famous patriotic essay which determined Mr. Smith, his Form-master, to go to the Front. You see, Miss Price, who is deputising for Mr. Smith, does not like lizards, and has an especial aversion to white rats, whereas Tommy is very fond of these and other dumb animals. ”

“ It’ll do you good.”
“Oh, don’t!” sobbed the poor boy. “It’ll hurt me.”
“No, it won’t! Don’t be a cry baby. We’ll make a man of you.”
But Tommy was not persuaded. He jumped up, and tried to make his escape. But, of course, there was no chance for him. Jim Smith overtook him in a couple of strides, and seizing him roughly by the collar, dragged him to the blanket, which by this time Palmer and one of the other boys, who had been impressed into the service reluctantly, were holding. ”

“ Tommy asked, when that eminent statesman moved away.
[pg 47]
"ANGELS IN 'THE HOUSE.'"
[pg 48]
"Now that's very odd indeed," said Tomlinson. "Just as you came up Parker Smith said to me 'Here comes Tommy Bowles; good fellow; means well; but don't you think he's making himself something of a bore?'"
So Parker Smith lost his chance, and perhaps will never know how or why. Thinking of these things 'tis quaint to find Tommy turning and biting the hand which, so to speak, held for him the Parliamentary bottle. "Et tu, Bowlsey!" Grandolph sighed again, thinking of the days that are no more. ”

“ Tommy—My step-mother is sick end now I'll get licked before every meal. The doctor says she must take exercise on an empty stomach.
Brown—"Peckhen has arrived safe. I just received a cablegram from him."
Smith—"Did he have a rough voyage?"
Brown—"No; his wife didn't go."
"Oh, live and let live, my man."
"Yes, I'd look well, wouldn't I? I'm a butcher."
[14] Smith—I notice that Robinson has an article in the paper this morning.
Jones—Indeed! I didn't see it. What was it?
Smith—His spring overcoat. He was taking it to the tailor to be pressed and cleaned. ”

“ Why shouldn't I?"
"Tommy, you are very direct," his mother cried, laughing. "Now you have finished breakfast, run out into the garden. I heard Mr. Smith's boys just now. I expect they are in the paddock."
"Athanasius doesn't play cricket badly," Tommy remarked meditatively, "only he caught a ball once on his spectacles. ”

“ Smith’s valuable quality is his interest in the life he lived and saw lived. He was zealous to record those trivial facts of to-day which become piquant to-morrow, a habit that reveals itself in the way he mentions his birth as happening “whilst Maddox was balancing a straw at the Little Theatre in the Haymarket, and Marylebone Gardens re-echoed the melodious notes of Tommy Lowe.” In a friend’s album he wrote—
“I can boast of seven events, some of which great men would be proud of:
“I received a kiss when a boy from the beautiful Mrs. Robinson ”

“ Tommy left, and McBride called Station 8. The answer was prompt. "Look, Jimmy, 6 doesn't answer. You send a couple of your men over—not your best, but a couple that you can spare. I'm going to call 4 and get Jud to send a couple of his assistant specialists over, too. I'll be over myself as soon as I can get there; but it will be a long haul for me. It's near the full diameter of the lens, and twenty-two million miles is no stone's throw." ”

“ The character of the neighbourhood round the “Farthing Pie House” (Portland Road Station) in Smith’s boyhood, may be judged by Smith’s statement in his Vagabondiana, that “when the sites of Portland Place, Devonshire Street, etc., were fields, the famous Tommy Lowe, then a singer at Mary-le-bone Gardens, raised a subscription, to enable an unfortunate man to run a small chariot, drawn by four muzzled mastiffs, from a pond near Portland Chapel, called Cockney Ladle, which supplied Mary-le-bone Bason with water, to the ‘Farthing Pie House’ ... ”

“ I wronged you. There is Belgium, where your sword
Has bled to death a free and gallant race
Whose life you held in ward;
Where on your trail the smoking land lies bare
Of hearth and homestead, and the dead babe clings
About its murdered mother's breast—ah, there,
Yes, you have done great things!
O. S.
TOMMY BROWN, RECRUITING SERGEANT.
Tommy Brown had been moved up into Form II., lest he should take root in Form I. He had been recommended personally by the master of Form I. to Mr. Smith, the guardian deity of Form II., as "the absolute limit." After a year of Tommy, Mr. ”

“ Peter Hope, M.A., of 16, Gough Square, of one hundred; Miss Jane Hope, adopted daughter of said Peter Hope (her real name nobody, herself included, ever having known) , and generally called Tommy, of three, paid for by herself after a battle royal with William Clodd; Mrs. Postwhistle, of Rolls Court, of ten, presented by the promoter; Mr. Pincer, of the House of Commons, also of ten (still owing for) ; Dr. Smith (né Schmidt) of fifty ”

“ We slung together a dixie of char and some bacon and bread for breakfast, and marched around to the "quarters", where they issued "tin hats", extra "ammo", and a second gas helmet. A good many of the men had been out before, and they did the customary "grousing" over the added load.
The British Tommy growls or grouses over anything and everything. He's never happy unless he's unhappy. He resents especially having anything officially added to his pack, and you can't blame him, for in full equipment he certainly is all dressed up like a pack horse. ”

“ Exactly in appearance as he is represented in the engraving,—he dresses in a coat of many colours, attends the neighbouring villages with spice, sometimes parades the streets of Durham with “pipe-clay for the lasses,” and on “gala days” wanders up and down with a cockade in his hat, beating the city drum, which is good-naturedly lent him by the corporation. Tommy, as worthless and insignificant as he seems, is nevertheless “put out to use:” his name has often served as a signature to satirical effusions ”

“ And how do we ken that there hasna been foul work there, and this man at the bottom o't? I tell you, before the world's half an hour older, I'll find out," and he looked significantly at Corp, who answered, quaking, "I winna gang by mysel', no, Tommy, I winna!"
So Tommy had to accompany him, saying, valiantly, "I'm no feared, and this rime is fine for hodding in," to which Corp replied, as firmly, "Neither am I, and we can aye keep touching cauld iron." Before they were half way down the Double Dykes they got a thrill, for they realized, simultaneously, that they were being followed. ”

“ ANON. "Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool?" "Yes sir, yes sir three bags full; One for my master and one for my dame, And one for the little boy who lives in the lane." Tommy Bangs looks quite smart, Driving along in his new goat cart, But Tommy's not one of your selfish boys, With every baby he shares his joys, Takes them to ride and lets them drive, Of course, they like Tommy The best boy alive. ”

“ He took the spade from Sammie’s hand, and soon had a hole sufficiently deep to hold a post when the dirt was filled in around it.
“Who is he?” asked Tommy of Teddy in a whisper, as the two lads were knocking more sides off the boxes.
“Johnny Green is his name, and everybody always calls him ‘Old,’ because there is another Mr. Green, of the same name, in town.”
“Is he a tramp?” asked Tommy.
“No, but he never works—that is, to make any money. He’s always willing to help everybody else at any work he sees going on, but he won’t work for himself—sort of shiftless, my father says.” ”

“ Nature, like a long-banished king, came back and claimed his own. An old hat belonging to his father hung upon a nail close at hand. Hurriedly placing this upon his head he tripped down the steps into the garden and followed the beckoning tempter.
Tommy hurried after his evil genius along the pathway which led through the orchard down to the bottom of the valley. In passing, Danster skilfully snatched a supply of half-ripe peaches from the laden trees, and hid the loot in a fold of his odoriferous kaross. This grated on Tommy’s sense of honour; his conscience lifted his head. ”

“ Perhaps it was unavoidable that Tommy should have made his best friends among the warm-hearted circus people who were very kind to him after his father’s death, and that long before the Child Labor Law permitted him to sing in Chicago saloons, he was doing a successful business singing in the towns of a neighboring state. He was a droll little chap “without any sense about taking care of himself,” and in those [Pg 70] days his mother not only missed his cheerful companionship but was constantly anxious about his health and morals. ”

“ He is young, ingenuous, not wholly lost to a sense of regard for his pastors and masters, lack of which is the curse of modern Youth. I believe Tommy respects me, and, only for the evil communications to which he is subject on the back bench, would work loyally with me in establishing the Arcade."
There was unwonted moisture in the Master Builder's eye as he turned round, and regarded the Member for King's Lynn what time he softly whistled to himself the old Jacobite air, "Tommy make Room for your Uncle."
Business done.—Vote of Censure moved by Prince Arthur ”