Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. by F. Anstey (pocket ebook reader TXT) 📖
- Author: F. Anstey
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But presently I discovered that the play was quite another sort of Adelphi, being a jocose comedy by a notorious ancient author of the name of Terence, and written entirely in Latin, which a contiguous damsel expressed a fear lest she should find it incomprehensible and obscure. I hastened to reassure her by explaining that, having been turned out as a certificated B.A. by Indian College, I had acquired perfect familiarity and nodding acquaintance with the early Roman and Latin tongues, and offering my services as interpreter of "quicquid agunt homines," and the entire "farrago libelli," which rendered her red as a turkeycock with delight and gratitude. When the performance commenced with a scenic representation of the Roman Acropolis, and a venerable elderly man soliloquising lengthily to himself, and then carrying on a protracted logomachy with another greybeard—although I understood sundry colloquial idioms and phrases such as "uxorem duxit," "carum mihi," "quid agis?" "cur amat?" and the like, all of which I assiduously translated vivâ voce—I could not succeed in learning the reason why they were having such a snip-snap, until the interval, when the lady informed me herself that it was because one of them had carried off a nautch-girl belonging to the other's son—which caused me to marvel greatly at her erudition.
I looked that, in the next portion of the performance, I might behold the nautch-girl, and witness her forcible rescue—or at least some saltatory exhibition; but, alack! she remained sotto voce and hermetically sealed; and though other characters, in addition to the elderly gentlemen, appeared, they were all exclusively masculine in gender, and there was nothing done but to converse by twos and threes. When the third portion opened with a long-desiderated peep of petticoats, I told my neighbour confidently that now at last we were to see this dancing girl and the abduction; but she replied that it was not so, for these females were merely the mother of the wife of another of the youths and her attendant ayah. And even this precious pair, after weeping and wringing their hands for a while, vanished, not to appear again.
Now as the entertainment proceeded, I fell into the dumps with increasing abashment and mortification to see everyone around me, ay, even the women and the tenderest juveniles! clap the hands and laugh in their sleeves with merriment at quirks and gleeks in which—in spite of all my classical proficiency—I could not discover le mot pour rire or crack so much as the cream of a jest, but must sit there melancholy as a gib cat or smile at the wrong end of mouth.
For, indeed, I began to fear that I had been fobbed off with the smattered education of a painted sepulchre, that I should fail so dolorously to comprehend what was plain as a turnpike-staff to the veriest British babe and suckling!
However, on observing more closely, I discovered that most of the grown-up adults present had books containing the translation of all the witticisms, which they secretly perused, and that the feminality were also provided with pink leaflets on which the dark outline of the plot was perspicuously inscribed.
Moreover, on casting my eyes up to the gallery, I perceived that there were overseers there armed with long canes, and that the small youths did not indulge in plaudations and hilarity except when threatened by these.
And thereupon I took heart, seeing that the proceedings were clearly veiled in an obsolete and cryptic language, and it was simply matter of rite and custom to applaud at fixed intervals, so I did at Rome as the Romans did, and was laughter holding both his sides as often as I beheld the canes in a state of agitation.
I am not unaware that it is to bring a coal from Newcastle to pronounce any critical opinion upon the ludibrious qualities of so antiquated a comedy as this, but, while I am wishful to make every allowance for its having been composed in a period of prehistoric barbarity, I would still hazard the criticism that it does not excite the simpering guffaw with the frequency of such modern standard works as exempli gratiâ, Miss Brown, or The Aunt of Charley, to either of which I would award the palm for pure whimsicality and gawkiness.
Candour compels me to admit, however, that the conclusion of the Adelphi, in which a certain magician summoned a black-robed, steeple-hatted demon from the nether world, who, after commanding a minion to give a pickle-back to sundry grotesque personages, did castigate their ulterior portions severely with a large switch, was a striking amelioration and betterment upon the preceding scenes, and evinced that Terence possessed no deficiency of up-to-date facetiousness and genuine humour; though I could not but reflect—"O, si sic omnia!" and lament that he should have hidden his vis comica for so long under the stifling disguise of a serviette.
I am a beggar at describing the hurly-burly and most admired disorder amidst which I performed the descent of the staircase in a savage perspiration, my elbows and heels unmercifully jostled by a dense, unruly horde, and going with nose in pocket, from trepidation due to national cowardice, while the seething mob clamoured and contended for overcoats and hats around very exiguous aperture, through which bewildered custodians handed out bundles of sticks and umbrellas, in vain hope to appease such impatience. Nor did I succeed to the recovery of my hat and paraphernalia until after twenty-four and a half minutes (Greenwich time), and with the labours of Hercules for the golden fleece!
"A GOLDEN-HEADED UMBRELLA, FRESH AS A ROSE."
For which I was minded at first to address a sharp remonstrance and claim for indemnity to some pundit in authority; but perceiving that by such fishing in troubled waters I was the gainer of a golden-headed umbrella, fresh as a rose, I decided to accept the olive branch and bury the bone of contention.
[Pg 18] IIIMr Jabberjee gives his views concerning the Laureateship.
It is "selon les règles" and rerum naturâ that the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty, being constitutionally partial to poetry, should desire to have constant private supply from respectable tip-top genius, to be kept snug on Royal premises and ready at momentary notice to oblige with song or dirge, according as High Jinks or Dolorousness are the Court orders of the day.
But how far more satisfactory if Right Hon'ble Marquis Salisbury, instead of arbitrarily decorating some already notorious bard with this "cordon bleu" and thus gilding a lily, should throw the office open to competition by public exam, and, after carefully weighing such considerations as the applicant's res angusta domi, the fluency of his imagination, his nationality, and so on—should award the itching palm of Fame to the poet who succeeded best in tickling his fancy!
Had some such method been adopted, the whole Indian Empire might to-day have been pleased as Punch by the selection of a Hindoo gentleman to do the job—for I should infallibly have entered myself for the running. Unfortunately such unparalleled opportunity of throwing soup to Cerberus, and exhibiting colour-blindness, has been given the slip, though the door is perhaps still open (even at past eleven o'clock p.m.) for retracing the false step and web of Penelope.
For I would respectfully submit to Her Imperial Majesty that, in her duplicate capacity of Queen of England and Empress of India, she has urgent necessity for a Court Poet for each department, who would be Arcades ambo and two of a trade, and share the duties with their proportionate pickings.
Or, if she would be unwilling to pay the piper to such a tune, I alone would work the oracle in both Indian and Anglo-Saxon departments, and waive the annual tub of sherry for equivalent in cash down.
And, if I may make the suggestion, I would strongly advise that this question of my joint (or several) appointment should be severely taken up by London Press as matter of simple justice to India. This is without prejudice to the already appointed Laureate as a swan and singing bird of the first water. All I desire is that the Public should know of another—and, perchance, even rarer—avis, who is nigroque simillima cygno, and could be obtained dog cheap for a mere song or a drug in the marketplace, if only there is made a National Appeal to the Sovereign that he should be promoted to such a sinecure and ære perennius.
As a specimen of the authenticity of my divine flatulence, please find inclosed herewith copy of complimentary verses, written by myself on hearing of Poet Austin's selection. Indulgence is kindly requested for very hasty composition, and circumstance of being greatly harrowed and impeded at time of writing by an excruciating full sized boil on back of neck, infuriated by collar of shirt, poulticings, and so forth.
Congratulatory Ode
To Hon'ble Poet-Laureate Alfred Austin, Esq.
Oh! when the wheezing zephyr brought glad news
Of your judicious appointment, no hearts who did peruse,
Such a long-desiderated slice of good luck were sorry at,
To a most prolific and polacious Poet-Laureate!
For no poeta nascitur who is fitter
To greet Royal progeny with melodious twitter.
Seated on the resplendent cloud of official Elysium,
Far away, far away from fuliginous busy hum
You are now perched with phenomenal velocity
On vertiginous pinnacle of poetic pomposity!
Yet deign to cock thy indulgent eye at the petition
Of one consumed by corresponding ambition,
And lend the helping hand to lift, pulley-hauley,
To Parnassian Peak this poor perspiring Bengali!
Whose ars poetica (as per sample lyric)
Is fully competent to turn out panegyric.
What if some time to come, perhaps not distant,
You were in urgent need of Deputy-Assistant!
For two Princesses might be confined simultaneously—
Then, how to homage the pair extemporaneously?
Or with Nuptial Ode, lack-a-daisy! What a fix
If with Influenza raging like cat on hot bricks!
In such a wrong box you will please remember yours truly,
Who can do the needful satisfactorily and duly,
By an epithalamium (or what not) to inflame your credit
With every coronated head that will have read it!
And the quid pro quo, magnificent and grand Sir!
Would be at the rate of four annas for every stanza,
Now, thou who scale sidereal paths afar dost,
Deign from thy brilliant boots to cast the superfluous star-dust
Upon
The head of him
Whose fate depends
On Thee!
(Signed) Baboo Hurry Bungsho Jabberjee.
The above was forwarded (post-paid) to Hon'ble Austin's official address at Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey (opposite the Royal Aquarium), but—hoity-toity and mirabile dictu!—no answer has yet been vouchsafed to yours truly save the cold shoulder of contemptuous inattention!
What a pity! Well-a-day, that we should find such passions of envy and jealousy in bosom of a distinguished poet, whose lucubrated productions may (for all that is known to the present writer) be no great shakes after all, and mere food for powder!
The British public is an ardent lover of the scintillating jewellery of fair play, and so I confidently submit my claims and poetical compositions to be arbitrated by the unanimous voice of all who understand such articles.
Let us remember that it is never too late to pull down the fallen idol out of the gilded shrine in which it has established itself with the egotistical isolation of a dog with the mange!
[Pg 24] IVContaining Mr Jabberjee's Impressions at The Old Masters.
I have the honour to report that the phantom of delight has recently recommenced to dance before me.
Miss Jessimina Mankletow, the perfumed, moony-faced daughter of the gracious and eagle-eyed goddess who presides over the select boarding establishment in which I am resident member, has of late emerged from the shell of superciliousness, and brought the beaming eye of encouragement to bear upon my diffidence and humility.
"MISS JESSIMINA MANKLETOW."
This I partly attribute to general impression—which I do not condescend to deny—that, at home, I occupy the social status of a Rajah, or some analogous kind of big native pot.
So, on a recent
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