CHAPTER IX. I APPEAR IN A MANNER BECOMING MY NAME AND LINEAGE
Fortune smiling at parting upon Monsieur de Balibari, enabled him to wina handsome sum with his faro-bank.
At ten o'clock the next morning, the carriage of the Chevalier deBalibari drew up as usual at the door of his hotel; and the Chevalier,who was at his window, seeing the chariot arrive, came down the stairsin his usual stately manner.
'Where is my rascal Ambrose?' said he, looking around and not findinghis servant to open the door.
'I will let down the steps for your honour,' said a gendarme, who wasstanding by the carriage; and no sooner had the Chevalier entered,than the officer jumped in after him, another mounted the box by thecoachman, and the latter began to drive.
'Good gracious!' said the Chevalier, 'what is this?'
'You are going to drive to the frontier,' said the gendarme, touchinghis hat.
'It is shameful--infamous! I insist upon being put down at the AustrianAmbassador's house!'
'I have orders to gag your honour if you cry out,' said the gendarme.
'All Europe shall hear of this!' said the Chevalier, in a fury.
'As you please,' answered the officer, and then both relapsed intosilence.
The silence was not broken between Berlin and Potsdam, through whichplace the Chevalier passed as His Majesty was reviewing his guardsthere, and the regiments of Bulow, Zitwitz, and Henkel de Donnersmark.As the Chevalier passed His Majesty, the King raised his hat and said,'Qu'il ne descende pas: je lui souhaite un bon voyage.' The Chevalier deBalibari acknowledged this courtesy by a profound bow.
They had not got far beyond Potsdam, when boom! the alarm cannon beganto roar.
'It is a deserter,' said the officer.
'Is it possible?' said the Chevalier, and sank back into his carriageagain.
Hearing the sound of the guns, the common people came out along the roadwith fowling-pieces and pitchforks, in hopes to catch the truant. Thegendarmes seemed very anxious to be on the look-out for him too. Theprice of a deserter was fifty crowns to those who brought him in.
'Confess, sir,' said the Chevalier to the police officer in the carriagewith him, 'that you long to be rid of me, from whom you can get nothing,and to be on the look-out for the deserter who may bring you in fiftycrowns? Why not tell the postilion to push on? You may land me at thefrontier and get back to your hunt all the sooner.' The officer toldthe postillion to get on; but the way seemed intolerably long tothe Chevalier. Once or twice he thought he heard the noise of horsegalloping behind: his own horses did not seem to go two miles an hour;but they DID go. The black and white barriers came in view at last, hardby Bruck, and opposite them the green and yellow of Saxony. The Saxoncustom-house officers came out.
'I have no luggage,' said the Chevalier.
'The gentleman has nothing contraband,' said the Prussian officers,grinning, and took their leave of their prisoner with much respect.
The Chevalier de Balibari gave them a Frederic apiece.
'Gentlemen,' said he, 'I wish you a good day. Will you please to go tothe house whence we set out this morning, and tell my man there to sendon my baggage to the "Three Kings" at Dresden?'
Then ordering fresh horses, the Chevalier set off on his journey forthat capital. I need not tell you that _I_ was the Chevalier.
'From the Chevalier de Balibari to Redmond Barry, Esquire, GentilhommeAnglais, a l'Hotel des 3 Couronnes, a Dresde en Saxe.
'Nephew Redmond,--This comes to you by a sure hand, no other than Mr.Lumpit of the English Mission, who is acquainted, as all Berlin willbe directly, with our wonderful story. They only know half as yet;they only know that a deserter went off in my clothes, and all are inadmiration of your cleverness and valour.
'I confess that for two hours after your departure I lay in bed in nosmall trepidation, thinking whether His Majesty might have a fancy tosend me to Spandau, for the freak of which we had both been guilty. Butin that case I had taken my precautions: I had written a statement ofthe case to my chief, the Austrian Minister, with the full and truestory how you had been set to spy upon me, how you turned out to bemy very near relative, how you had been kidnapped yourself into theservice, and how we both had determined to effect your escape. The laughwould have been so much against the King, that he never would have daredto lay a finger upon me. What would Monsieur de Voltaire have saidto such an act of tyranny? But it was a lucky day, and everything hasturned out to my wish. As I lay in my bed two and a half hours afteryour departure, in comes your ex-Captain Potzdorff. "Redmont!" says he,in his imperious High-Dutch way, "are you there?" No answer. "The rogueis gone out," said he; and straightway makes for my red box where I keepmy love-letters, my glass eye which I used to wear, my favourite luckydice with which I threw the thirteen mains at Prague; my two sets ofParis teeth, and my other private matters that you know of.
'He first tried a bunch of keys, but none of them would fit the littleEnglish lock. Then my gentleman takes out of his pocket a chisel andhammer, and falls to work like a professional burglar, actually burstingopen my little box!
'Now was my time to act. I advance towards him armed with an immensewater-jug. I come noiselessly up to him just as he had broken the box,and with all my might I deal him such a blow over the head as smashesthe water-jug to atoms, and sends my captain with a snort lifeless tothe ground. I thought I had killed him.
'Then I ring all the bells in the house; and shout and swear andscream, "Thieves!--thieves!--landlord!--murder!--fire!" until the wholehousehold come tumbling up the stairs. "Where is my servant?" roar I."Who dares to rob me in open day? Look at the villain whom I find inthe act of breaking my chest open! Send for the police, send for hisExcellency the Austrian Minister! all Europe shall know of this insult!"
'"Dear Heaven!" says the landlord, "we saw you go away three hours ago!"
'"ME!" says I; "why, man, I have been in bed all the morning. I amill--I have taken physic--I have not left the house this morning! Whereis that scoundrel Ambrose? But, stop! where are my clothes and wig?"for I was standing before them in my chamber-gown and stockings, with mynightcap on.
'"I have it--I have it!" says a little chambermaid: "Ambrose is off inyour honour's dress."
'"And my money--my money!" says I; "where is my purse with forty-eightFrederics in it? But we have one of the villains left. Officers, seizehim!"
'"It's the young Herr von Potzdorff!" says the landlord, more and moreastonished.
'"What! a gentleman breaking open my trunk with hammer andchisel--impossible!"
'Herr von Potzdorff was returning to life by this time, with a swellingon his skull as big as a saucepan; and the officers carried him off, andthe judge who was sent for dressed a proces verbal of the matter, and Idemanded a copy of it, which I sent forthwith to my ambassador.
'I was kept a prisoner to my room the next day, and a judge, a general,and a host of lawyers, officers, and officials, were set upon me tobully, perplex, threaten, and cajole me. I said it was true you had toldme that you had been kidnapped into the service, that I thought you werereleased from it, and that I had you with the best recommendations. Iappealed to my Minister, who was bound to come to my aid; and, to makea long story short, poor Potzdorff is now on his way to Spandau; and hisuncle, the elder Potzdorff, has brought me five hundred louis, with ahumble request that I would leave Berlin forthwith, and hush up thispainful matter.
'I shall be with you at the "Three Crowns" the day after you receivethis. Ask Mr. Lumpit to dinner. Do not spare your money--you are my son.Everybody in Dresden knows your loving uncle,
'THE CHEVALIER DE BALIBARI.'
And by these wonderful circumstances I was once more free again: and Ikept my resolution then made, never to fall more into the hands of anyrecruiter, and henceforth and for ever to be a gentleman.
With this sum of money, and a good run of luck which ensued presently,we were enabled to make no ungenteel figure. My uncle speedily joinedme at the inn at Dresden, where, under preten
ce of illness, I hadkept quiet until his arrival; and, as the Chevalier de Balibari was inparticular good odour at the Court of Dresden (having been an intimateacquaintance of the late monarch, the Elector, King of Poland, the mostdissolute and agreeable of European princes), I was speedily in the verybest society of the Saxon capital: where I may say that my own personand manners, and the singularity of the adventures in which I had been ahero, made me especially welcome. There was not a party of the nobilityto which the two gentlemen of Balibari were not invited. I had thehonour of kissing hands and being graciously received at Court by theElector, and I wrote home to my mother such a flaming description of myprosperity, that the good soul very nearly forgot her celestial welfareand her confessor, the Reverend Joshua Jowls, in order to come after meto Germany; but travelling was very difficult in those days, and so wewere spared the arrival of the good lady.
I think the soul of Harry Barry, my father, who was always so genteelin his turn of mind, must have rejoiced to see the position which I nowoccupied; all the women anxious to receive me, all the men in a fury;hobnobbing with dukes and counts at supper, dancing minuets withhigh-well-born baronesses (as they absurdly call themselves in Germany),with lovely excellencies, nay, with highnesses and transparenciesthemselves: who could compete with the gallant young Irish noble? whowould suppose that seven weeks before I had been a common--bah! I amashamed to think of it! One of the pleasantest moments of my life was ata grand gala at the Electoral Palace, where I had the honour of walkinga polonaise with no other than the Margravine of Bayreuth, old Fritz'sown sister: old Fritz's, whose hateful blue-baize livery I had worn,whose belts I had pipeclayed, and whose abominable rations of small beerand sauerkraut I had swallowed for five years.
Having won an English chariot from an Italian gentleman at play, myuncle had our arms painted on the panels in a more splendid way thanever, surmounted (as we were descended from the ancient kings) with anIrish crown of the most splendid size and gilding. I had this crown inlieu of a coronet engraved on a large amethyst signet-ring worn on myforefinger; and I don't mind confessing that I used to say the jewel hadbeen in my family for several thousand years, having originally belongedto my direct ancestor, his late Majesty King Brian Boru, or Barry. Iwarrant the legends of the Heralds' College are not more authentic thanmine was.
At first the Minister and the gentlemen at the English hotel used to berather shy of us two Irish noblemen, and questioned our pretensions torank. The Minister was a lord's son, it is true, but he was likewise agrocer's grandson; and so I told him at Count Lobkowitz's masquerade.My uncle, like a noble gentleman as he was, knew the pedigree ofevery considerable family in Europe. He said it was the only knowledgebefitting a gentleman; and when we were not at cards, we would passhours over Gwillim or D'Hozier, reading the genealogies, learning theblazons, and making ourselves acquainted with the relationships ofour class. Alas! the noble science is going into disrepute now: so arecards, without which studies and pastimes I can hardly conceive how aman of honour can exist.
My first affair of honour with a man of undoubted fashion was on thescore of my nobility, with young Sir Rumford Bumford of the Englishembassy; my uncle at the same time sending a cartel to the Minister, whodeclined to come. I shot Sir Rumford in the leg, amidst the tears of joyof my uncle, who accompanied me to the ground; and I promise you thatnone of the young gentlemen questioned the authenticity of my pedigree,or laughed at my Irish crown again.
What a delightful life did we now lead! I knew I was born a gentleman,from the kindly way in which I took to the business: as businessit certainly is. For though it SEEMS all pleasure, yet I assure anylow-bred persons who may chance to read this, that we, their betters,have to work as well as they: though I did not rise until noon, yet hadI not been up at play until long past midnight? Many a time have we comehome to bed as the troops were marching out to early parade; and oh!it did my heart good to hear the bugles blowing the reveille beforedaybreak, or to see the regiments marching out to exercise, and thinkthat I was no longer bound to that disgusting discipline, but restoredto my natural station.
I came into it at once, and as if I had never done anything else all mylife. I had a gentleman to wait upon me, a French friseur to dress myhair of a morning; I knew the taste of chocolate as by intuition almost,and could distinguish between the right Spanish and the French beforeI had been a week in my new position; I had rings on all my fingers,watches in both my fobs, canes, trinkets, and snuffboxes of all sorts,and each outvying the other in elegance. I had the finest natural tastefor lace and china of any man I ever knew; I could judge a horse as wellas any Jew dealer in Germany; in shooting and athletic exercises Iwas unrivalled; I could not spell, but I could speak German and Frenchcleverly. I had at the least twelve suits of clothes; three richlyembroidered with gold, two laced with silver, a garnet-coloured velvetpelisse lined with sable; one of French grey, silver-laced, and linedwith chinchilla. I had damask morning robes. I took lessons on theguitar, and sang French catches exquisitely. Where, in fact, was there amore accomplished gentleman than Redmond de Balibari?
All the luxuries becoming my station could not, of course, be purchasedwithout credit and money: to procure which, as our patrimony had beenwasted by our ancestors, and we were above the vulgarity and slowreturns and doubtful chances of trade, my uncle kept a faro-bank. Wewere in partnership with a Florentine, well known in all the Courtsof Europe, the Count Alessandro Pippi, as skilful a player as ever wasseen; but he turned out a sad knave latterly, and I have discovered thathis countship was a mere imposture. My uncle was maimed, as I have said;Pippi, like all impostors, was a coward; it was my unrivalled skill withthe sword, and readiness to use it, that maintained the reputation ofthe firm, so to speak, and silenced many a timid gambler who might havehesitated to pay his losings. We always played on parole with anybody:any person, that is, of honour and noble lineage. We never pressed forour winnings or declined to receive promissory notes in lieu of gold.But woe to the man who did not pay when the note became due! Redmondde Balibari was sure to wait upon him with his bill, and I promise youthere were very few bad debts: on the contrary, gentlemen weregrateful to us for our forbearance, and our character for honour stoodunimpeached. In later times, a vulgar national prejudice has chosento cast a slur upon the character of men of honour engaged in theprofession of play; but I speak of the good old days in Europe, beforethe cowardice of the French aristocracy (in the shameful Revolution,which served them right) brought discredit and ruin upon our order. Theycry fie now upon men engaged in play; but I should like to know how muchmore honourable THEIR modes of livelihood are than ours. The broker ofthe Exchange who bulls and bears, and buys and sells, and dabbles withlying loans, and trades on State secrets, what is he but a gamester? Themerchant who deals in teas and tallow, is he any better? His bales ofdirty indigo are his dice, his cards come up every year instead of everyten minutes, and the sea is his green table. You call the profession ofthe law an honourable one, where a man will lie for any bidder; lie downpoverty for the sake of a fee from wealth, lie down right because wrongis in his brief. You call a doctor an honourable man, a swindling quack,who does not believe in the nostrums which he prescribes, and takes yourguinea for whispering in your ear that it is a fine morning; andyet, forsooth, a gallant man who sits him down before the baize andchallenges all comers, his money against theirs, his fortune againsttheirs, is proscribed by your modern moral world. It is a conspiracyof the middle classes against gentlemen: it is only the shopkeeper cantwhich is to go down nowadays. I say that play was an institution ofchivalry: it has been wrecked, along with other privileges of men ofbirth. When Seingalt engaged a man for six-and-thirty hours withoutleaving the table, do you think he showed no courage? How have we hadthe best blood, and the brightest eyes, too, of Europe throbbing roundthe table, as I and my uncle have held the cards and the bank againstsome terrible player, who was matching some thousands out of hismillions against our all which was there on the baize! when we engagedthat daring Alex
is Kossloffsky, and won seven thousand louis in a singlecoup, had we lost, we should have been beggars the next day; when HElost, he was only a village and a few hundred serfs in pawn the worse.When, at Toeplitz, the Duke of Courland brought fourteen lacqueys, eachwith four bags of florins, and challenged our bank to play againstthe sealed bags, what did we ask? 'Sir,' said we, 'we have but eightythousand florins in bank, or two hundred thousand at three months. Ifyour Highness's bags do not contain more than eighty thousand, we willmeet you.' And we did, and after eleven hours' play, in which ourbank was at one time reduced to two hundred and three ducats, we wonseventeen thousand florins of him. Is THIS not something like boldness?does THIS profession not require skill, and perseverance, and bravery?Four crowned heads looked on at the game, and an Imperial princess, whenI turned up the ace of hearts and made Paroli, burst into tears. Noman on the European Continent held a higher position than Redmond Barrythen; and when the Duke of Courland lost, he was pleased to say that wehad won nobly; and so we had, and spent nobly what we won.
At this period my uncle, who attended mass every day regularly, alwaysput ten florins into the box. Wherever we went, the tavern-keepers madeus more welcome than royal princes. We used to give away the broken meatfrom our suppers and dinners to scores of beggars who blessed us. Everyman who held my horse or cleaned my boots got a ducat for his pains.I was, I may say, the author of our common good fortune, by puttingboldness into our play. Pippi was a faint-hearted fellow, who was alwayscowardly when he began to win. My uncle (I speak with great respect ofhim) was too much of a devotee, and too much of a martinet at play everto win GREATLY. His moral courage was unquestionable, but his daring wasnot sufficient. Both of these my seniors very soon acknowledged me to betheir chief, and hence the style of splendour I have described.
I have mentioned H.I.H. the Princess Frederica Amelia, who was affectedby my success, and shall always think with gratitude of the protectionwith which that exalted lady honoured me. She was passionately fond ofplay, as indeed were the ladies of almost all the Courts in Europe inthose days, and hence would often arise no small trouble to us; for thetruth must be told, that ladies love to play, certainly, but not to PAY.The point of honour is not understood by the charming sex; and it waswith the greatest difficulty, in our peregrinations to the variousCourts of Northern Europe, that we could keep them from the table, couldget their money if they lost, or, if they paid, prevent them from usingthe most furious and extraordinary means of revenge. In those great daysof our fortune, I calculate that we lost no less than fourteen thousandlouis by such failures of payment. A princess of a ducal house gave uspaste instead of diamonds, which she had solemnly pledged to us; anotherorganised a robbery of the Crown jewels, and would have charged thetheft upon us, but for Pippi's caution, who had kept back a note of hand'her High Transparency' gave us, and sent it to his ambassador; by whichprecaution I do believe our necks were saved. A third lady of high (butnot princely) rank, after I had won a considerable sum in diamonds andpearls from her, sent her lover with a band of cut-throats to waylay me;and it was only by extraordinary courage, skill, and good luck, thatI escaped from these villains, wounded myself, but leaving the chiefaggressor dead on the ground: my sword entered his eye and broke there,and the villains who were with him fled, seeing their chief fall. Theymight have finished me else, for I had no weapon of defence.
Thus it will be seen that our life, for all its splendour, was one ofextreme danger and difficulty, requiring high talents and courage forsuccess; and often, when we were in a full vein of success, we weresuddenly driven from our ground on account of some freak of a reigningprince, some intrigue of a disappointed mistress, or some quarrel withthe police minister. If the latter personage were not bribed or wonover, nothing was more common than for us to receive a sudden order ofdeparture; and so, perforce, we lived a wandering and desultory life.
Though the gains of such a life are, as I have said, very great, yet theexpenses are enormous. Our appearance and retinue was too splendid forthe narrow mind of Pippi, who was always crying out at my extravagance,though obliged to own that his own meanness and parsimony would neverhave achieved the great victories which my generosity had won. With allour success, our capital was not very great. That speech to the Dukeof Courland, for instance, was a mere boast as far as the two hundredthousand florins at three months were concerned. We had no credit, andno money beyond that on our table, and should have been forced to fly ifhis Highness had won and accepted our bills. Sometimes, too, we werehit very hard. A bank is a certainty, ALMOST; but now and then a bad daywill come; and men who have the courage of good fortune, at least, oughtto meet bad luck well: the former, believe me, is the harder task of thetwo.
One of these evil chances befell us in the Duke of Baden's territory, atMannheim. Pippi, who was always on the look-out for business, offeredto make a bank at the inn where we put up, and where the officers of theDuke's cuirassiers supped; and some small play accordingly took place,and some wretched crowns and louis changed hands: I trust, rather tothe advantage of these poor gentlemen of the army, who are surely thepoorest of all devils under the sun.
But, as ill luck would have it, a couple of young students from theneighbouring University of Heidelberg, who had come to Mannheim fortheir quarter's revenue, and so had some hundred of dollars betweenthem, were introduced to the table, and, having never played before,began to win (as is always the case). As ill luck would have it, too,they were tipsy, and against tipsiness I have often found the bestcalculations of play fail entirely. They played in the most perfectlyinsane way, and yet won always. Every card they backed turned up intheir favour. They had won a hundred louis from us in ten minutes; and,seeing that Pippi was growing angry and the luck against us, I was forshutting up the bank for the night, saying the play was only meant for ajoke, and that now we had had enough.
But Pippi, who had quarrelled with me that day, was determined toproceed, and the upshot was, that the students played and won more;then they lent money to the officers, who began to win, too; and in thisignoble way, in a tavern room thick with tobacco-smoke, across adeal table besmeared with beer and liquor, and to a parcel of hungrysubalterns and a pair of beardless students, three of the most skilfuland renowned players in Europe lost seventeen hundred louis! I blushnow when I think of it. It was like Charles XII or Richard Coeur de Lionfalling before a petty fortress and an unknown hand (as my friend Mr.Johnson wrote), and was, in fact, a most shameful defeat.
Nor was this the only defeat. When our poor conquerors had gone off,bewildered with the treasure which fortune had flung in their way(one of these students was called the Baron de Clootz, perhaps he whoafterwards lost his head at Paris), Pippi resumed the quarrel of themorning, and some exceedingly high words passed between us. Among otherthings I recollect I knocked him down with a stool, and was for flinginghim out of the window; but my uncle, who was cool, and had beenkeeping Lent with his usual solemnity, interposed between us, and areconciliation took place, Pippi apologising and confessing he had beenwrong.
I ought to have doubted, however, the sincerity of the treacherousItalian; indeed, as I never before believed a word that he said in hislife, I know not why I was so foolish as to credit him now, and go tobed, leaving the keys of our cash-box with him. It contained, after ourloss to the cuirassiers, in bills and money, near upon L8000 sterling.Pippi insisted that our reconciliation should be ratified over a bowl ofhot wine, and I have no doubt put some soporific drug into the liquor;for my uncle and I both slept till very late the next morning, and wokewith violent headaches and fever: we did not quit our beds till noon. Hehad been gone twelve hours, leaving our treasury empty; and behind hima sort of calculation, by which he strove to make out that this was hisshare of the profits, and that all the losses had been incurred withouthis consent.
Thus, after eighteen months, we had to begin the world again. But was Icast down? No. Our wardrobes still were worth a very large sum of money;for gentlemen did not dress like parish-clerks in those
days, anda person of fashion would often wear a suit of clothes and a set ofornaments that would be a shop-boy's fortune; so, without repining forone single minute, or saying a single angry word (my uncle's temper inthis respect was admirable), or allowing the secret of our loss tobe known to a mortal soul, we pawned three-fourths of our jewels andclothes to Moses Lowe the banker, and with the produce of the sale, andour private pocket-money, amounting in all to something less than 800louis, we took the field again.