in love on his own account, and privately contracted himself unto the
fair daughter of a noble Athenian.
'Here we have a striking example of one of the manifold advantages of
civilisation and refinement. If the prince had lived in later days, he
might at once have married the object of his father's choice, and then
set himself seriously to work, to relieve himself of the burden which
rested heavily upon him. He might have endeavoured to break her heart by
a systematic course of insult and neglect; or, if the spirit of her sex,
and a proud consciousness of her many wrongs had upheld her under this
ill-treatment, he might have sought to take her life, and so get rid of
her effectually. But neither mode of relief suggested itself to Prince
Bladud; so he solicited a private audience, and told his father.
'it is an old prerogative of kings to govern everything but their
passions. King Lud flew into a frightful rage, tossed his crown up to
the ceiling, and caught it again--for in those days kings kept their
crowns on their heads, and not in the Tower--stamped the ground, rapped
his forehead, wondered why his own flesh and blood rebelled against him,
and, finally, calling in his guards, ordered the prince away to instant
Confinement in a lofty turret; a course of treatment which the kings of
old very generally pursued towards their sons, when their matrimonial
inclinations did not happen to point to the same quarter as their own.
'When Prince Bladud had been shut up in the lofty turret for the greater
part of a year, with no better prospect before his bodily eyes than a
stone wall, or before his mental vision than prolonged imprisonment, he
naturally began to ruminate on a plan of escape, which, after months
of preparation, he managed to accomplish; considerately leaving his
dinner-knife in the heart of his jailer, lest the poor fellow (who had
a family) should be considered privy to his flight, and punished
accordingly by the infuriated king.
'The monarch was frantic at the loss of his son. He knew not on whom to
vent his grief and wrath, until fortunately bethinking himself of the
lord chamberlain who had brought him home, he struck off his pension and
his head together.
'Meanwhile, the young prince, effectually disguised, wandered on
foot through his father's dominions, cheered and supported in all his
hardships by sweet thoughts of the Athenian maid, who was the innocent
cause of his weary trials. One day he stopped to rest in a country
village; and seeing that there were gay dances going forward on the
green, and gay faces passing to and fro, ventured to inquire of a
reveller who stood near him, the reason for this rejoicing.
'"Know you not, O stranger," was the reply, "of the recent proclamation
of our gracious king?"
'"Proclamation! No. What proclamation?" rejoined the prince--for he had
travelled along the by and little-frequented ways, and knew nothing of
what had passed upon the public roads, such as they were.
'"Why," replied the peasant, "the foreign lady that our prince wished
to wed, is married to a foreign noble of her own country, and the king
proclaims the fact, and a great public festival besides; for now, of
course, Prince Bladud will come back and marry the lady his father
chose, who they say is as beautiful as the noonday sun. Your health,
sir. God save the king!"
'The prince remained to hear no more. He fled from the spot, and plunged
into the thickest recesses of a neighbouring wood. On, on, he wandered,
night and day; beneath the blazing sun, and the cold pale moon; through
the dry heat of noon, and the damp cold of night; in the gray light of
morn, and the red glare of eve. So heedless was he of time or object,
that being bound for Athens, he wandered as far out of his way as Bath.
'There was no city where Bath stands, then. There was no vestige of
human habitation, or sign of man's resort, to bear the name; but there
was the same noble country, the same broad expanse of hill and dale, the
same beautiful channel stealing on, far away, the same lofty mountains
which, like the troubles of life, viewed at a distance, and partially
obscured by the bright mist of its morning, lose their ruggedness and
asperity, and seem all ease and softness. Moved by the gentle beauty of
the scene, the prince sank upon the green turf, and bathed his swollen
feet in his tears.
'"Oh!" said the unhappy Bladud, clasping his hands, and mournfully
raising his eyes towards the sky, "would that my wanderings might
end here! Would that these grateful tears with which I now mourn hope
misplaced, and love despised, might flow in peace for ever!"
'The wish was heard. It was in the time of the heathen deities, who used
occasionally to take people at their words, with a promptness, in some
cases, extremely awkward. The ground opened beneath the prince's feet;
he sank into the chasm; and instantaneously it closed upon his head for
ever, save where his hot tears welled up through the earth, and where
they have continued to gush forth ever since.
'It is observable that, to this day, large numbers of elderly ladies and
gentlemen who have been disappointed in procuring partners, and almost
as many young ones who are anxious to obtain them, repair annually
to Bath to drink the waters, from which they derive much strength and
comfort. This is most complimentary to the virtue of Prince Bladud's
tears, and strongly corroborative of the veracity of this legend.'
Mr. Pickwick yawned several times when he had arrived at the end of this
little manuscript, carefully refolded, and replaced it in the inkstand
drawer, and then, with a countenance expressive of the utmost weariness,
lighted his chamber candle, and went upstairs to bed. He stopped at Mr.
Dowler's door, according to custom, and knocked to say good-night.
'Ah!' said Dowler, 'going to bed? I wish I was. Dismal night. Windy;
isn't it?'
'Very,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'Good-night.'
'Good-night.'
Mr. Pickwick went to his bedchamber, and Mr. Dowler resumed his seat
before the fire, in fulfilment of his rash promise to sit up till his
wife came home.
There are few things more worrying than sitting up for somebody,
especially if that somebody be at a party. You cannot help thinking how
quickly the time passes with them, which drags so heavily with you; and
the more you think of this, the more your hopes of their speedy arrival
decline. Clocks tick so loud, too, when you are sitting up alone, and
you seem as if you had an under-garment of cobwebs on. First, something
tickles your right knee, and then the same sensation irritates your
left. You have no sooner changed your position, than it comes again
in the arms; when you have fidgeted your limbs into all sorts of queer
shapes, you have a sudden relapse in the nose, which you rub as if to
rub it off--as there is no doubt you would, if you could. Eyes, too, are
mere personal inconveniences; and the wick of one candle gets an inch
and a half long, while you are snuffing the other. These, and various
other little nervous annoyances, render sitting up for a length of time
after everybody else has gone to bed, anything but a cheerful amusement.
This was just Mr. Dowler's opinion, as he sat before the fire, and felt
honestly indignant with all the inhuman people at the party who were
keeping him up. He was not put into better humour either, by the
reflection that he had taken it into his head, early in the evening, to
think he had got an ache there, and so stopped at home. At length, after
several droppings asleep, and fallings forward towards the bars, and
catchings backward soon enough to prevent being branded in the face, Mr.
Dowler made up his mind that he would throw himself on the bed in the
back room and think--not sleep, of course.
'I'm a heavy sleeper,' said Mr. Dowler, as he flung himself on the bed.
'I must keep awake. I suppose I shall hear a knock here. Yes. I thought
so. I can hear the watchman. There he goes. Fainter now, though. A
little fainter. He's turning the corner. Ah!' When Mr. Dowler arrived at
this point, he turned the corner at which he had been long hesitating,
and fell fast asleep.
Just as the clock struck three, there was blown into the crescent a
sedan-chair with Mrs. Dowler inside, borne by one short, fat chairman,
and one long, thin one, who had had much ado to keep their bodies
perpendicular: to say nothing of the chair. But on that high ground,
and in the crescent, which the wind swept round and round as if it were
going to tear the paving stones up, its fury was tremendous. They were
very glad to set the chair down, and give a good round loud double-knock
at the street door.
They waited some time, but nobody came.
'Servants is in the arms o' Porpus, I think,' said the short chairman,
warming his hands at the attendant link-boy's torch.
'I wish he'd give 'em a squeeze and wake 'em,' observed the long one.
'Knock again, will you, if you please,' cried Mrs. Dowler from the
chair. 'Knock two or three times, if you please.'
The short man was quite willing to get the job over, as soon as
possible; so he stood on the step, and gave four or five most startling
double-knocks, of eight or ten knocks a-piece, while the long man went
into the road, and looked up at the windows for a light.
Nobody came. It was all as silent and dark as ever.
'Dear me!' said Mrs. Dowler. 'You must knock again, if you please.'
'There ain't a bell, is there, ma'am?' said the short chairman.
'Yes, there is,' interposed the link-boy, 'I've been a-ringing at it
ever so long.'
'It's only a handle,' said Mrs. Dowler, 'the wire's broken.'
'I wish the servants' heads wos,' growled the long man.
'I must trouble you to knock again, if you please,' said Mrs. Dowler,
with the utmost politeness.
The short man did knock again several times, without producing the
smallest effect. The tall man, growing very impatient, then relieved
him, and kept on perpetually knocking double-knocks of two loud knocks
each, like an insane postman.
At length Mr. Winkle began to dream that he was at a club, and that the
members being very refractory, the chairman was obliged to hammer the
table a good deal to preserve order; then he had a confused notion of an
auction room where there were no bidders, and the auctioneer was buying
everything in; and ultimately he began to think it just within the
bounds of possibility that somebody might be knocking at the street
door. To make quite certain, however, he remained quiet in bed for
ten minutes or so, and listened; and when he had counted two or
three-and-thirty knocks, he felt quite satisfied, and gave himself a
great deal of credit for being so wakeful.
'Rap rap-rap rap-rap rap-ra, ra, ra, ra, ra, rap!' went the knocker.
Mr. Winkle jumped out of bed, wondering very much what could possibly
be the matter, and hastily putting on his stockings and slippers, folded
his dressing-gown round him, lighted a flat candle from the rush-light
that was burning in the fireplace, and hurried downstairs.
'Here's somebody comin' at last, ma'am,' said the short chairman.
'I wish I wos behind him vith a bradawl,' muttered the long one.
'Who's there?' cried Mr. Winkle, undoing the chain.
'Don't stop to ask questions, cast-iron head,' replied the long man,
with great disgust, taking it for granted that the inquirer was a
footman; 'but open the door.'
'Come, look sharp, timber eyelids,' added the other encouragingly.
Mr. Winkle, being half asleep, obeyed the command mechanically, opened
the door a little, and peeped out. The first thing he saw, was the red
glare of the link-boy's torch. Startled by the sudden fear that the
house might be on fire, he hastily threw the door wide open, and holding
the candle above his head, stared eagerly before him, not quite certain
whether what he saw was a sedan-chair or a fire-engine. At this instant
there came a violent gust of wind; the light was blown out; Mr. Winkle
felt himself irresistibly impelled on to the steps; and the door blew
to, with a loud crash.
'Well, young man, now you HAVE done it!' said the short chairman.
Mr. Winkle, catching sight of a lady's face at the window of the sedan,
turned hastily round, plied the knocker with all his might and main, and
called frantically upon the chairman to take the chair away again.
'Take it away, take it away,' cried Mr. Winkle. 'Here's somebody coming
out of another house; put me into the chair. Hide me! Do something with
me!'
All this time he was shivering with cold; and every time he raised
his hand to the knocker, the wind took the dressing-gown in a most
unpleasant manner.
'The people are coming down the crescent now. There are ladies with 'em;
cover me up with something. Stand before me!' roared Mr. Winkle. But
the chairmen were too much exhausted with laughing to afford him the
slightest assistance, and the ladies were every moment approaching
nearer and nearer. Mr. Winkle gave a last hopeless knock; the ladies
were only a few doors off. He threw away the extinguished candle, which,
all this time he had held above his head, and fairly bolted into the
sedan-chair where Mrs. Dowler was.
Now, Mrs. Craddock had heard the knocking and the voices at last; and,
only waiting to put something smarter on her head than her nightcap,
ran down into the front drawing-room to make sure that it was the right
party. Throwing up the window-sash as Mr. Winkle was rushing into the
chair, she no sooner caught sight of what was going forward below, than
she raised a vehement and dismal shriek, and implored Mr. Dowler to get
