Page images
PDF
EPUB

BROKEN-DOWN GENTLEMEN.

133

There are some few positions in life in this nineteenth century, almost invariably filled by persons who were never intended for anything of the kind: as, for instance, to be a schoolmaster is generally "the accident of an accident;" and to keep a turnpike, holds the same place in humble life; while a little higher in the scale, to "order your coals," or "sell you wine," or to be "private and confidential secretary to an elderly gentleman of high estate;" these all are spheres of action, if not of idleness, supposed to require no "special training or qualification." To these must be added-especially now that "something under Government" requires at least the education of a charity boy-"something to do upon a railway." No doubt the number of steady men promoted to fill the higher offices in railway life is daily on the increase; still, in the course of a hundred miles we are or at least we used to be-whirled by no small number of broken-down gentlemen or disappointed men. At this moment there rises before our mind the soured and enduring looks of one or two, evidently doomed, for the sins of their youth, to hard and irksome labours for the term of their natural lives.

Poor Mr. Hengen's was a case of this kind; and if we fit together bits of Mr. Hengen's

history as he related it to others, as well as to the Doctor, at different times, it would run as follows; and we know not for how many railway officials the same story might not, with a little change of names and incidents, be made to serve.

CHAPTER XI.

THE DYING STATION-MASTER'S HISTORY.

"I HAVE not a relation in the world but my two dear girls; and if from the time I was a youth I had never had a relation, but had been thrown entirely on my own resources, it had been far better for me. The truth is, in early days I was buoyed up with false expectations; I was tricked with delusive views of things, till I was nearly thirty years of age. By that time I had squandered my own little inheritancehowever little then, it would have seemed large, indeed, just now-on mere amusements, and as pocket-money; for, between the home of my own. mother in early life, and the home of my wife's mother a little later-rent, taxes, and housekeeping seemed, like the sunshine and the shower,too much things of course to say 'Thank you' for.

"In the course of this time I had talked of all kinds of professions, but followed none; though I soon felt that public opinion and the feelings of society were more and more against me, as also that I was uncomfortably living amidst a general expectation that, of course, I should do something soon-which kind of general presumption at length resulted in very uncomplimentary hints and marks of contempt at the idle life I was living at the time then present. This was too evident to escape notice, even among some of the younger, and certainly among all the middle-aged people; but as to the old and intimate friends of the family, they did not care to mince the matter in the least, but sorely nettled me, by speaking out and giving way to certain very ominous remarks-remarks, of which I never saw the exact truth till far too latenamely, that this state of things could not last for ever; and one old gentleman, yet more significantly said, 'Now mark my words, young man, some fine morning you will find yourself left high and dry, and live to curse the cruel kindness of your relations: for I have lived quite long enough in the world to see that, dying without Wills, and all the caprices of fortune, are so common as to seem a natural visitation upon those who depend on resources not their own.'

LEFT HIGH AND DRY."

137

"The old man added something more, about there being in the human mind an innate resentment against idleness; indeed, that men who take an honest and industrious part in the great workshop of this busy world, are out of all patience at seeing others coolly reaping what they did not sow-and 'Served them right,' was the first exclamation, whenever they were stranded, and left to work out the hard problem of life for themselves.

"Before I was thirty-one years of age all this was verified to the letter; the very words my tormentors had used, formed the most truthful picture of all that happened. My wife's mother died-bequeathing, or intending to bequeath, her daughter fifteen thousand pounds. Consols, besides a residue not worth much. But the said fifteen thousand pounds were in trust the deceased had only a life-interest, with what is called 'power of appointment,' or of bequeathing it by Will-which power, if she failed to execute, it was directed that the money should be paid over to another member of the family.

"I never shall forget the quiet sneer, the air of triumph, and the cold satisfaction, scarcely concealed beneath the thinnest veil of courtesy and business-manners, when I applied to the

« PreviousContinue »