THE NEW LODGER.

Auckland Star, Volume I, Issue 198, 27 August 1870, Page 2

THE NEW LODGER.

Hood's quaintriess and rich humour always combine an air of truthfulness and simplicity, which render the efforts of his pen life like and natural, as well as entertaining. The productions ,of comic writers are generally ephemeral in their character,—light and amusing for the time, but in a few fleeting years, from the change of manners and sentiments, their quips and oddities lose the point and smartness which they possessed; ( but Hrod " held the mirror up to nature 'so truly, that we may gaze on the pictures which he delineates with an enduring interest, every touch of his pen reminding us of some reality which we hare met with in actual experience. The following sketch may be taken as an instance of these qualities : — " Poor Miss Hopkinson! She had been ill for a fortnight, of a disorder which especially affected the nerves ; and quiet, as Dr. Boreham declared, was indispensably necessary for her recovery. Ho the Servants wore list shoes, and the knocker was tied up, and the street in front of number four was covered with straw. , In the meanwhile the invalid derived js? >at comiort from the unremitting atI intions of her friends and acquaintance ; she was particularly gratified by the ' constant kind enquiries of Mr. Tweedy, the new lodger, who occupied the apartments immediately over her head. " If you please, ma'am," said Mary, for the hundredth time, " it's Mr. Tweedy's compliments, and begs to know if you feel .any better?" |f/ 1 am infinitely obliged to Mr. Tweedy, i/ni sure," whispered the sufferer —" lam la leetle easier—with my best thanks and

compliments." JN off, Miss Hopkinson was a spinster lady of a certain age, and she was not a little flattered by the uncommon interest the gentleman above stairs seemed to take in her state of health. She could not help recollecting that the new lodger and a very smart new cap had entered the house on the same day. She had fortunately worn the novel article on her accidental ■encounter with the stranger ; and, as she used to say, a great deal depended on first impressions. " What a very nice gentleman 1" remarked the nurse, as Mary closed the bedroom door. " What an uncommon nice man !" cried Miss Filby, an old familiar gossip, who had come to cheer up the invalid with all the scandal of the neighbourhood. "And he will send, ma'am," said the nurse to the visitor, "to ask alter us a matter of five or six times a day." " It is really extraordinary," said Miss Filby, " and especially in quite a stranger!" " IS o, not quite," whispered the invalid ; "I met him twice octhe stairs." " Indeed !" said Miss Filby. " it's like a little romance. Who knows what may oome of it? I hare known as sudden things come to pass before now." " There is summut in it surely," said the nurse. " I only wish, ma'am, you could hear how warm and pressing he is in asking after her, whoever comes in his way. There was this morning, on the landing —' Is urse,' says he, quite earnestlike, 'Nurse, do tell me how she is?' ' Why, then, sir,' says I, ' she is as well as can be expected.' 'Ah,' said he, 'that's the old answer, but it won't satisfy me. Is she better or worse ?' ' Well, then, sir,' says I, ' she's much the same.' ' Ah,' says he, fetching sich a long-winded sigh, 'there's where it is. the may linger in that way for months.' ' Let us hope not,' says I. ' You will be pleased to hear as how she's going to try to eat a bit o' chicken.' ' Chicking ! ' says he, saving your presence, ma'am, —'chicking! it's her nerves, nurse, her nerves ; how are her nerves ?' 'To be sure, sir,' says I I them's her weak pints, but Dr. Boreham do say, provided they're kept quiet, and not played upon, they'll come round agin in time.' ' Yes,' says he, 'in time, that's the divil on it;' and you can't think how feeling he said it.—'What aweary time,' says he, ' she have been !' " " Well, upon my word," exclaimed Miss Filby, " these are very like love symptoms, indeed. However, I'm not jealous, my dear," and she shook her head waggishly at the invalid, who replied with a faint smile, that she was a giddy creature, and quite forgot the weak state of her nerves. II But to be sure, it is odd," said Miss Hopkinson to herself, " and particularly in the present age, when polite gallantry to females is so much gone out of fashion." then fell into a reverie, which her friend interpreted into an inclination to doze, and accordingly took her lenve, with a promise of returning in the evening. No sooner was her back lurned, however, than the invalid called the nurse to her, and after giving sundry directions as to costume intimated that she had an intention of trying (o sit up a bit. So

she was dressed and washed and bolstered

up in a chair, and having put on a clean cap, she inquired of her attendant, lather anxiously, if she was not dreadfully altered and pulled down, and how she looked. To which the nurse answered " except looking a littlo delicate, she whs really charming."

Tn the evening the doctor repeated his visit, and so did Miss Filby, who could not help rallying tlie invalid on the sudden recovery of her complexion. " It's only hectic," said Miss Hop.kinson, " the exertion of dressing has given me a colour."

"And somebody else will have a colour too," said the nurse, winking at AJiss Filby, " when I tell him how very much some folks aro improved."

" liy-the 03'," said Ur. Eoreham, " its only fair that prople should know their well wishers; and I ought to to tell you therefore, that the gentleman overhead is very friendly and frequent in his enquiries. We generally meet on the stairs

and I assure you he expresses very great solicitude—very much so indeed !" Miss Hopkinson gave a short husky cough, and the nurse and Miss Filby nodded significantly at each other. " Ho! ho ! the wind sits in that quarter, does it p" said the doctor. " I may expect, then, to have another patient. 'He grew sick as she grew well,' as the old song says," and, chuckling at the aptness of his own quotation, the mediciner took his leave. fl "There he is again, I declare, exclaimed the nurse, who had listened as she closed the door. "He has cotched the doctor on the stairs, and I'll warrant he'll have the whole particulars before he let's him go.'* " Very devoted, indeed!" said Miss Filby. "We must make haste, and gel you about again, my dear, for his poor sake as well as your own." At this junction Mrs. Huckins, the landlady, entered the room to ask after her lodger, and was not a little bewildered by a cross-fire of inuendoes from the nurse and the visitor. The strange behaviour of the sick lady herself helped besides to disconcert the worthy woman, across whose mind a suspicion glanced that the nasty laudanum, or something, had made the patient a little off her head. However, Mrs. Huckias got through her compliments and her curtesys, and would finally {perhaps have tittered too, but that her attention was suddenly diverted by that most awful of intrusions, a troublesome child in a sick room.

" Why Billy, you little plague—why, Billy, what do you do inhere? Where have you come from, sir?—l've been looking for you this half hour." " I've been up with Mr. Tweedy, the new lodger," said Billy, standing very erect, and speaking rather proudly. " We've been n-playing the flute." "The what!" cried all the female voices in a breath.

" A-plying the flute, repeated the undaunted Billy. " Mr. Tweedy only whispers a toon into it now, but he says he'll play out loud as soon as ever the old" — here Billy looked at the invalid, and then at his mother—"he says he'll play out loud as soon as ever Miss Hopkinson, is well, or else dead!" #•#■•"#

" Pray how did you leave Miss Hopkinson, ma'am," inquired Mr. Tweedy, about an hour afterwards, of a female whom he met at the foot of the stairs.

" Miss Hopkinson, sir! oh, you horrid wicked wretch ! you unfeeling monster !" —and totally forgetting the weak nerves of her friend, the indignant Miss Filby rushed past the New Lodger, darted along the passage, let herself out, and slammed the street-door behind her with a bang, that shook Miss Hopkinson in her chair.