The Paris Sketch Book of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh; and the Irish Sketch Book. William Makepeace Thackeray
it were but for a day. I knew she would share her crust with me, as she had done for so long a time before; and hoped that, now, as I was taller and stronger, I might find work more easily in the neighbourhood.
‘You may fancy what a fête it was when I came back; though I’m sure we cried as much as if it had been a funeral. Mother got into a fit, which frightened us all; and as for Aunt Bridget, she skreeled away for hours together, and did not scold for two days at least. Little Pierre offered me the whole of his supper; poor little man! his slice of bread was no bigger than before I went away.
‘Well, I got a little work here, and a little there; but still I was a burden at home rather than a breadwinner; and, at the closing in of the winter, was very glad to hear of a place at two leagues’ distance, where work, they said, was to be had. Off I set, one morning, to find it, but missed my way, somehow, until it was night-time before I arrived.—Night-time and snow again; it seemed as if all my journeys were to be made in this bitter weather.
‘When I came to the farmers door, his house was shut up, and his people all a-bed; I knocked for a long while in vain; at last he made his appearance at a window upstairs, and seemed so frightened, and looked so angry, that I suppose he took me for a thief. I told him how I had come for work. “Who comes for work at such an hour?” said he. “Go home, you impudent baggage, and do not disturb honest people out of their sleep.” He banged the window to; and so I was left alone to shift for myself as I might. There was no shed, no cowhouse, where I could find a bed; so I got under a cart, on some straw; it was no very warm berth. I could not sleep for the cold; and the hours passed so slowly, that it seemed as if I had been there a week, instead of a night; but still it was not so bad as the first night when I left home, and when the good farmer found me.
‘In the morning, before it was light, the farmer’s people came out, and saw me crouching under the cart: they told me to get up; but I was so cold that I could not: at last the man himself came, and recognised me as the girl who had disturbed him the night before. When he heard my name and the purpose for which I came, this good man took me into the house, and put me into one of the beds out of which his sons had just got; and if I was cold before, you may be sure I was warm and comfortable now: such a bed as this I had never slept in, nor ever did I have such good milk-soup as he gave me out of his own breakfast. Well, he agreed to hire me; and what do you think he gave me?—six sous a day! and let me sleep in the cowhouse besides: you may fancy how happy I was now, at the prospect of earning so much money.
‘There was an old woman among the labourers who used to sell us soup: I got a cupful every day for a halfpenny, with a bit of bread in it; and might eat as much beetroot besides as I liked: not a very wholesome meal, to be sure, but God took care that it should not disagree with me.
‘So, every Saturday, when work was over, I had thirty sous to carry home to mother; and tired though I was, I walked merrily the two leagues to our village, to see her again. On the road there was a great wood to pass through, and this frightened me; for if a thief should come and rob me of my whole week’s earnings, what could a poor lone girl do to help herself? But I found a remedy for this too, and no thieves ever came near me; I used to begin saying my prayers as I entered the forest, and never stopped until I was safe at home; and safe I always arrived, with my thirty sous in my pocket.—Ah! you may be sure, Sunday was a merry day for us all.’
. … .
This is the whole of Beatrice’s history which is worthy of publication; the rest of it only relates to her arrival in Paris, and the various masters and mistresses whom she there had the honour to serve. As soon as she enters the capital the romance disappears, and the poor girl’s sufferings and privations luckily vanish with it. Beatrice has got now warm gowns, and stout shoes, and plenty of good food. She has had her little brother from Picardy; clothed, fed, and educated him: that young gentleman is now a carpenter, and an honour to his profession. Madame Merger is in easy circumstances, and receives, yearly, fifty francs from her daughter. To crown all, Mademoiselle Beatrice herself is a funded proprietor, and consulted the writer of this biography as to the best method of laying out a capital of two hundred francs, which is the present amount of her fortune.
God bless her! she is richer than his Grace the Duke of Devonshire; and, I dare to say, has, in her humble walk, been more virtuous and more happy than all the dukes in the realm.
It is, indeed, for the benefit of dukes and such great people (who, I make no doubt, have long since ordered copies of these Sketches from Mr. Macrone) that poor little Beatrice’s story has been indited. Certain it is that the young woman would never have been immortalised in this way, but for the good which her betters may derive from her example. If your ladyship will but reflect a little, after boasting of the sums which you spend in charity; the beef and blankets which you dole out at Christmas; the poonah-painting which you execute for fancy fairs; the long, long sermons which you listen to at St. George’s, the whole year through;—your ladyship, I say, will allow that, although perfectly meritorious in your line, as a patroness of the Church of England, of Almack’s, and of the Lying-in Asylum, yours is but a paltry sphere of virtue, a pitiful attempt at benevolence, and that this honest servant-girl puts you to shame! And you, my Lord Bishop; do you, out of your six sous a day, give away five to support your flock and family? Would you drop a single coach-horse (I do not say a dinner, for such a notion is monstrous in one of your lordship’s degree) to feed any one of the starving children of your lordship’s mother—the Church?
I pause for a reply. His lordship took too much turtle and cold punch for dinner yesterday, and cannot speak just now; but we have, by this ingenious question, silenced him altogether: let the world wag as it will, and poor Christians and curates starve as they may, my lord’s footmen must have their new liveries, and his horses their four feeds a day.
. … .
When we recollect his speech about the Catholics—when we remember his last charity sermon—but I say nothing. Here is a poor benighted superstitious creature, worshipping images, without a rag to her tail, who has as much faith, and humility, and charity, as all the reverend bench.
. … .
This angel is without a place; and for this reason (besides the pleasure of composing the above slap at Episcopacy)—I have indited her history. If the Bishop is going to Paris, and wants a good honest maid-of-all-work, he can have her, I have no doubt; or if he chooses to give a few pounds to her mother, they can be sent to Mr. Titmarsh, at the publisher’s.
Here is Miss Merger’s last letter and autograph. The note was evidently composed by an écrivain public:—
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