Part 7

“Mr. Patterson,” said Dogberry, coming towards the door, “your character can stand it—it can stand anything—mine can’t.”

“There’s truth in that,” said Mr. Patterson aside to me. “Gentlemen, let us leave the pedagogue to his reflections; and now it occurs to me that we had better not uncage him, for, boys, he would be a witness against you; more, witness, judge, jury and executioner—by the by, clear against law. Were I in your place, I would appeal, and for every stripe he gives you, should the judgment be reversed, do you give him two.”

Here a sprightly fellow, one of the scholars, named Morris, from Long Green, ran up the steps and said to Mr. Patterson,

“Do, sir, have him out, for if we get him into the frolic too, we are as safe, sir, as if we were all in our beds. He has seen us all through some infernal crack or other.”

“Ah,” exclaimed Mr. Patterson, in a low tone to Morris, “he has been playing Cowper, has he—looking from the loopholes of retreat, seeing the Babel and not feeling the stir?”

“Yes sir, but he’ll make a stir about it to-morrow.”

“He shall come forth, then,” said Mr. Patterson; “Dogberry, open the door; they speak of removing Sears, and why don’t you come forth and greet your friends? We have an idea of getting the appointment for you.”

This flattery took instant effect, for we heard Dogberry bustling to the door, and in a moment it was opened about half way, and the usher put his head out, and said, but with the evident wish that his invitation would be refused, “Will you come in sir? Why, William Russell!” to me, in surprise.

“Pale face, this is a youthful brave, whom I want the pale face to teach the arts of his race. Behold! I am the Charming Serpent. Come forth and taste of the fire-water.”

As Mr. Patterson spoke, he took Dogberry by the hand, and pulled him on to the platform. The usher was greeted with loud acclamations and laughter by the crowd. He, however, did not relish it, and was frightened out of his wits. He really looked the personification of a caricature. His head was covered with an old flannel nightcap, notwithstanding it was warm weather, and his trousers were held up by his hips, while his suspenders dangled about his knees. On his right leg he had an old boot, and on his left foot an old shoe, and was without coat or vest. As Mr. Patterson held up the light, so that the crowd below could see him, there was such a yelling as had not been heard on the spot since those whose characters the crowd were assuming had left it.

Dogberry hastily withdrew into his room, but followed by Mr. Patterson and myself, each bearing a light. When we entered, the crowd rushed up the steps.

“For God’s sake, sir, for the sake of my character and situation, don’t let them come in here.”

“They shall not, if you will promise to drink with me. Pale face, speak, will you drink with the Pawnee?”

“Yes sir,” said Dogberry, faintly.

The Charming Serpent here went to the door, and said,

“Brothers, the Charming Serpent would hold a private talk with the chief of the pale faces. Ere long, he will be with you. Let the Big Bull (one of the lawyers was named Bull, and he was very humorous,) pass round the fire-water and the calumet, and by that time the Charming Serpent will come forth. Brothers, give unto the Charming Serpent some of the fire-water, that he may work his spells.”

A dozen handed up bottles of different wines and liquors. The Charming Serpent gave Dogberry the candles to hold, took a bottle of Champaigne, and handed me another. Then shutting the door, he said,

“This is the fire-water that hath no evil in it. It courses through the veins like a silvery lake through the prairie, where the wild grass waves green and placid, and it makes the heart merry like the merriment of birds in the spring-time, and not with the fierce fires of the dark lake, like the strong fire-water, that glows red as the living coal. Brothers, we will drink.”

Dogberry’s apartment was indeed an humble one. Only in the centre of it could you stand upright. Over our heads were the rafters and bare shingles, formed exactly in the shape of the capital letter A inverted, or rather V. Opposite the door was a little window of four panes of glass, and under it, or rather beside it, in the corner, was a little bedstead, with a straw mattrass upon it. A small table, with a tumbler and broken pitcher, and candle in a tin candlestick on it, stood opposite the bed. A board, nailed across from rafter to rafter, held a few books, and beside it, on nails, were several articles of clothing. There were besides in the apartment two chairs, and a wooden chest in the corner, by the door.

“Come, drink, my old boy,” exclaimed Patterson.

“Thank you, Mr. Patterson, your character can stand it, I tell you, but mine can’t.”

“Friend of my soul, this goblet sip,” reiterated Patterson, offering Dogberry the glass.

“Thank you, Mr. Patterson, I would not choose any,” said he.

“You can’t but choose, Dogberry; there is no alternative. Do you remember what the poet beautifully says of the Roman daughter, who sustained her imprisoned father from her own breast?—

‘Drink, drink and live, old man; Heaven’s realm holds no such tide.’

Do you remember it? I bid you drink, then, and I say to you, Hebe nor Ganymede ever offered to the immortals purer wine than that. Drink! here’s to you, Dogberry, and to your speedy promotion,” and Mr. Patterson swallowed every drop in the glass, and re-filling it, handed it to the usher.

Without much hesitation, he drank it. He now filled me up a glass nearly full, and I followed the example of my preceptor, he the while looking at me with astonishment.

“How do you like the letter, Mr. Dogberry?” asked Mr. Patterson of the pedagogue.

“What letter, sir? Mr. Patterson, I must say this is a strange proceeding. I don’t know, sir, to what you allude.”

“Don’t know to what I allude! Why, the letter wishing to know if you would take the academy at the same price at which Sears now holds it.”

“Sir, I have received no such letter. I certainly, sir, would, if it was thought that I was—”

“Was competent. Merit is always modest; you’re the most competent of the two, sir—take some.”

So saying, Mr. Patterson filled up the tumbler, and Dogberry swallowed the compliment and the wine together, and fixed his eye on the rafters with an exulting look. While he was so gazing, the lawyer filled his glass, and observed, “Come, drink, and let me open this other bottle; I want a glass myself.” Down went the wine, and, with a smack of his lips, Dogberry handed the glass to Mr. Patterson.

“Capital, ain’t it, eh?”

“Capital,” re-echoed Dogberry. The wine and his supposed honors had aroused the brain of the pedagogue in a manner which seemed to awake him to a new existence. While Mr. Patterson was striking the top from the other bottle, Dogberry handed me the candle which he held—the other he had put in his candlestick, taking out his own when he first drank—and lifting the tumbler, he stood ready.

Again he quaffed a bumper. The effect of his potations on him was electrical. He had a long face, with a snipe-like nose, which was subjected to a nervous twitching whenever its owner was excited. It now danced about, seemingly, all over his face, while his naturally cadaverous countenance, under the excitement, turned to a glowing red, and his small ferret eyes looked both dignified and dancing, merry and important. “So,” exclaimed he, “I am to be principal of the academy; ha, ha, ha! oh, Lord! William Russell, I would reprove you on the spot, but that you are in such distinguished company.”

Whether Dogberry meant only Mr. Patterson, or included himself, I do not know, but as he spoke he arose, and paced his humble apartment with a proud tread, forgetting what a figure he cut, with his suspenders dangling about his knees and his nightcap on, and forgetting also that his attic was not high enough to admit his head to be carried at its present altitude. The consequence was that he struck it against one of the rafters, with a violence that threatened injury to the rafter, if not to the head. He stooped down to rub the affected part, when Mr. Patterson said to him,

“‘Pro-di-gi-ous,’ as Dominie Sampson, one of you, said, ain’t it? Come, we’ll finish this bottle, and then go forth. The scholars are all rejoiced at your promotion, and are all assembled without to do you honor. They have made complete saturnalia of it. They marvel now why you treat them with so much reserve.”

“Gad, I’ll do it,” exclaimed Dogberry, taking the tumbler and swallowing the contents.

“Just put your blanket around you,” said Patterson to him. “Let your nightcap remain; it becomes you.”

“No, it don’t indeed, though, eh?”

“It does, ’pon honor. That’s it. Now, pale face, come forth; the eloquence of the Charming Serpent has prevailed.”

So speaking, Mr. Patterson opened the door, and we stepped on to the platform.

The scene without was grotesque in the extreme. In front of us, I suppose to the number of an hundred persons, were the frolickers, composed of lawyers, students and town’s-people, all seated in a circle, while Mr. Patterson’s client from the West, dressed in costume, was giving the Pawnee war dance. This client was a rough uneducated man, but full of originality and whim. Mr. Patterson had gained a suit for him, in which the title to an estate in the neighborhood was involved, worth upwards of sixty thousand dollars. The whole bar had believed that the suit could not be sustained by Patterson, but his luminous mind had detected the clue through the labyrinths of litigation, where they saw nothing but confusion and defeat. His client was overjoyed at the result, as every one had croaked defeat to him. He gave Mr. Patterson fifteen thousand dollars, five more than he had promised, and besides had made him a present of the splendid Indian dress in which, as a bit of fun, before the frolic commenced, he had decked himself, under the supervision of his client, who acted as his costumer, and afterwards dressed himself in the same way. The client had a great many Indian dresses with him, which he had collected with great care, and on this occasion he threw open his trunks, and supplied nearly the whole bar.

The name of Mr. Patterson’s client was Blackwood, and the admiration which he excited seemed to give him no little pleasure. Most of the lawyers in the circle had something Indian on them, while the boys, who could not appear in costume, and were determined to appear wild, had turned their jackets wrong side out, and swapped with each other, the big ones with the little, so that one wore his neighbor’s jacket, the waist of which came up under his arms, and exhibited the back of his vest, while the other wore a coat the hip buttons of which were at his knees.

On the outskirts of this motley assembly could be seen, here and there, a negro, who might be said at once to contribute to the darkness that surrounded the scene and to reflect light upon it, for their black skins were as ebon as night, while their broad grins certainly had something luminous about them, as their white teeth shone forth.

We stood about a minute admiring the dance, when it was concluded, and some one espied us, and pointed us out to the rest. We, or rather I should say Dogberry, was greeted with three times three. I have never seen, for the size of the assembly, such an uproarious outbreak of bacchanalian merriment. After the cheers were given, many of the boys threw themselves on the grass and rolled over and over, shouting as they rolled. Others jerked their fellows’ hats off, and hurled them in air. Prettyman stood with his arms folded, as if he did not know what to make of it, and then deliberately spreading his blanket on the ground, as deliberately took a seat in the centre of it, as if determined to maintain the full possession of his faculties, and, like an amateur at a play, enjoy the scene. Morris held his sides, stooped down his head, and glanced sideways cunningly at Dogberry, throwing his head back every now and then with a sudden jerk, while loud explosive bursts of laughter, from his very heart, echoed through the village above every other sound.

“A speech from Dogberry!” exclaimed Prettyman.

“Ay, a speech!” shouted Morris, “a speech!”

“No, gentlemen, not now,” exclaimed Richardson, the proprietor of one of the hotels; “I sent down to my house an hour ago, and have had a collation served. Mr. Patterson, and gentlemen and students all, I invite you to partake with me.”

“Silence!” called out Mr. Patterson. All were silent. “Students of the Belle Air Academy and citizens generally, I have the honor to announce to you that my friend, Mr. Dogberry, is about to supersede Mr. Sears. We must form a procession and place him in our midst, the post of honor, and then to mine host’s.” So speaking, Mr. Patterson descended, followed by Dogberry and myself. The students gave their candles to the negroes to hold, joined their hands, and danced round Dogberry with the wildest glee, while he received it all in drunken dignity.

When I have seen since, in Chapman’s floating theatre, or in a barn or shed, some lubberly, drunken son of the sock and buskin enact Macbeth, with the witches about him, I have recalled this scene, and thought that the boys looked like the witches and Dogberry like the Thane, when the witches greet him:

‘All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter!’

The procession was at length formed. Surrounded by the boys, who rent the air with shouts, with his nightcap on his head and his blanket around him, with one boot and one shoe, Dogberry, following immediately after the judges, proceeded with them to Richardson’s hotel. Whenever there was the silence of a minute or two, some boy or other would ask Dogberry not to remember on the morrow that he saw them out that night.

“No, boys, no, certainly not; this thing, I understand, is done in honor of me. I shan’t take Sears in even as an assistant. Boys, he has not used me well.”

We arrived at Richardson’s as well as we could, having business on both sides of the street. His dining-room was a very large one, and he had a very fine collation set out, with plenty of wines and other liquors. Judge Willard took the head of the table and Judge Nolan the foot. Dogberry was to the right of Judge Willard and Mr. Patterson to the left. He made me sit beside him. The eating was soon despatched, and it silenced us all a little, while it laid the groundwork for standing another supply of wine, which was soon sparkling in our glasses, and we were now all more excited than ever. It was amusing to see the merry faces of my schoolmates twinkling about among the crowd, trying to catch and comprehend whatever was said by the lawyers, particularly those that were distinguished.

Songs were sung, sentiments given, and Indian talks held by the quantity. Dogberry looked the while first at the boys and then at the lawyers and then at himself, not knowing whether or not the scene before him was a reality or a dream. The great respect which the boys showed him, and Patterson’s making an occasional remark to him, seemed at last not only fully to impress him with the reality, but also with a full, if not a sober conviction of his own importance.

“A song!—a song!” was shouted by a dozen of the larger students; “a song from Morris. Give us ‘Down with the pedagogue Sears.’ Hurrah for old Dogberry—Dogberry forever.”

“No,” cried out others, “a speech from Mr. Patterson—no, from the Pawnee. You’re fineable for not speaking in character.”

Here Prettyman took Mr. Patterson courteously by the hand, and said something to him in a whisper.

“Ah ha!” exclaimed Mr. Patterson, “so shall it be; I like Morris. Come, my good fellow, sing us the song you wrote; come, Dogberry’s star is now in the ascendant. ‘Down with the pedagogue Sears’—let’s have it.”

Nothing loth, Morris was placed on the table, while the students gathered round him, ready to join the chorus. Taking a preparatory glass of wine, while Mr. Patterson rapped on the table by way of commanding silence, Morris placed himself in an attitude and sang the following song, which he had written on some rebellious occasion or other:

SONG.

You may talk of the study of imperial power, And tell how their subjects must fawn, cringe and cower, And offer the incense of tears; But I tell you at once, that there’s none can compare With the tyrant that rules o’er the lads of Belle Air, So down with the pedagogue Sears. (Chorus,) Down, down, Down with the pedagogue Sears.

The serf has his Sunday—the negroes tell o’er Their Christmas, the Fourth, aye, and many days more, When they feel themselves any man’s peers; But we’re tasked night and day by the line and the rule, And Sunday’s no Sunday, for there’s Sunday school, So down with the pedagogue Sears. (Chorus,) Down, down, &c.

So here’s to the lad who can talk to his lass, And here’s to the lad who can take down his glass, And is only a lad in his years: Who can stand up and act a bold part like a man, And do just whatever another man can, So down with the pedagogue Sears. (Chorus,) Down, down, Down with the pedagogue Sears—

“Hip, hip, hurrah—once more,” shouted Morris. “Now then”—

Down, down, So down with the pedagogue Sears.

While the whole room was in uproarious chorusing, who should enter but Sears himself. He looked round with stern dignity and surprise, at first uncertain on whom to fix his indignation, when his eye lit on Dogberry, who, the most elated and inebriated of all, was flourishing his nightcap over his head, and shouting, at the top of his voice,

“Down with the pedagogue Sears.”

As soon as Sears caught a view of Dogberry, he advanced towards him, as if determined to inflict personal chastisement on the usher. At first Dogberry prepared again to vociferate the chorus, but when he caught the eye of Sears, his voice failed him, and he moved hastily towards Mr. Patterson, who slapped him on the shoulder, and cried out,

“Dogberry, be true to yourself.”

“I am true to myself. Yes, my old boy, old Sears, you’re no longer head devil at Belle Air Academy. You’re no devil at all, or if you are, old boy, you’re a poor devil, and be d—d to you.”

“You’re a drunken outcast, sir,” exclaimed Sears. “Never let me see your face again; I dismiss you from my service,” and so speaking, he took a note book from his pocket, and began hastily to take down the names of the students. The Big Bull saw this, and caught it from his hand.

“Sir, sir,” exclaimed Sears, enraged, “my vocation, and not any respect I bear you, prevents my infliction of personal chastisement upon you. Boys, young gentlemen, leave instantly for your respective boarding houses.”

During this, Patterson was clapping Dogberry on the shoulder, evidently endeavoring to inspire him with courage.

“Tell him yourself,” I overheard Dogberry say.

“No, no,” replied Patterson, “it is your place.”

“Well, then, I’ll tell you at once, Sears, you’re no longer principal of this academy; you’re dished. Mr. Patterson, sir, will tell you so.”

“Mr. Patterson!” exclaimed Sears, now for the first time recognizing, in the semblance of the Indian chief, the distinguished lawyer and statesman. “Sir, I am more than astonished.”

“Sir,” rejoined Patterson, drawing himself up with dignity, “I am a Pawnee brave; more, a red man eloquent or a pale face eloquent, as it pleases me; but, sir, under all circumstances, I respect your craft and calling. What more dignified than such? A poor, unfriended boy, I was taken by the hand by an humble teacher of a country school, and here I stand, let me say sir, high in the councils of a great people. Peace to old Playfair’s ashes. The old philosopher, like Porson, loved his cups, and, like Parr, loved his pipe; but, sir, he was a ripe scholar and a noble spirit, and I have so said, sir, in the humble monument which I am proud, sir, I was enabled, through the education he gave me, to build over him.

‘After life’s fitful fever, he sleeps well.’

Yes, as some one says, he was ‘my friend before I had flatterers.’ How proud he was of me! I remember well catching his eye in making my first speech, and the approving nod he gave me had more gratification to me than the approbation of bench, bar and audience. Glorious old Playfair! Mr. Sears, you were his pupil too. Many a time have I heard him speak of you; he said, of all his pupils, you were the one to wear his mantle. And, sir, that was the highest compliment he could pay you—the highest, Mr. Speaker, for he esteemed himself of the class of the philosophers, the teachers of youth. Sir, Mr. Sears, I propose to you that in testimony of our life-long respect for him, we drink to his memory.”

This was said so eloquently, and withal so naturally, that Sears, forgetful of his whereabouts, took the glass which Mr. Patterson offered him, and drank its contents reverently to the memory of his old teacher.

“Sir,” resumed Patterson, “how glorious is your vocation! But tell me, do you subscribe to the sentiment of Don Juan?—

‘Oh ye! who teach the ingenuous youth of nations, Holland, France, England, Germany or Spain, I pray ye flog them upon all occasions— It mends their morals—never mind the pain.’”

The appropriate quotation caused a thrill to run through the assembled students, while they cast ominous looks at each other. For the life of him, Sears could not resist a smile.

At this Mr. Patterson glanced at us with a quiet meaning, and turning to Mr. Sears, he continued: “The elder Adams taught school—he whose eloquence Jefferson has so loudly lauded—the man who was for liberty or death, and so expressed himself in that beautiful letter to his wife. Do you not remember that passage, sir, where he speaks of the Fourth being greeted thereafter with bonfires and illuminations? His son, Johnny Q., taught school. My dark-eyed friend Webster, who is now figuring so gloriously in the halls of Congress and in the Supreme Court, taught school. Judge Rowan, of Kentucky, a master spirit too, taught school. Who was that

‘Who passed the flaming bounds of time and space, The living throne, the sapphire blaze, Where angels tremble as they gaze: Who saw, but, blasted with excess of light, Closed his eyes in endless night’—

Who was he? Milton, the glorious, the sublime—who, in his aspirations for human liberty, prayed to that great spirit who, as he himself says, “sends forth the fire from his altar to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleaseth”—Milton, the schoolmaster.

‘If fallen in evil days on evil tongues, Milton appealed to the avenger, Time: If Time, the avenger, execrates his wrongs, And if the word ‘Miltonic’ mean ‘sublime,’ He deigned not to belie his soul in songs, Nor turn his very talent to a crime; He did not loathe the sire to laud the son, But closed the tyrant-hater he begun.

‘Thinkest thou, could he—the blind old man—arise, Like Samuel, from the grave, to freeze once more The blood of monarchs with his prophecies, Or be alive again—again, all hoar With time and trials, and those helpless eyes And heartless daughters, worn, and pale, and poor—’

Would he not be proud of his vocation, when he reflected how many great spirits had followed his example? The schoolmaster is indeed abroad. Mr. Sears, let us drink the health of the blind old man eloquent.”