Lavengro - George Borrow (nice books to read TXT) 📗

a great regard for you, and as I am in Parliament, and have frequent opportunities of speaking to the Ministry, I shall take care to tell them how desirable it would be to secure your services. It is true they are Tories, but I think that even Tories would give up their habitual love of jobbery in a case like yours, and for once show themselves disposed to be honest men and gentlemen; indeed, I have no doubt they will; for, having so deservedly an infamous character, they would be glad to get themselves a little credit, by a presentation which could not possibly be traced to jobbery or favouritism.” The writer begged his friend to give himself no trouble about the matter, as he was not desirous of the appointment, being in tolerably easy circumstances, and willing to take some rest after a life of labour. All, however, that he could say was of no use, his friend indignantly observing that the matter ought to be taken entirely out of his hands, and the appointment thrust upon him for the credit of the country. “But may not many people be far more worthy of the appointment than myself?” said the writer. “Where?” said the friendly Radical. “If you don’t get it, it will be made a job of, given to the son of some steward, or, perhaps, to some quack who has done dirty work; I tell you what, I shall ask it for you, in spite of you; I shall, indeed!” and his eyes flashed with friendly and patriotic fervour through the large pair of spectacles which he wore.

And, in fact, it would appear that the honest and friendly patriot put his threat into execution. “I have spoken,” said he, “more than once to this and that individual in Parliament, and everybody seems to think that the appointment should be given to you. Nay, that you should be forced to accept it. I intend next to speak to Lord A⁠⸺.”403 And so he did, at least it would appear so. On the writer calling upon him one evening, about a week afterwards, in order to take leave of him, as the writer was about to take a long journey for the sake of his health, his friend no sooner saw him than he started up in a violent fit of agitation, and glancing about the room, in which there were several people, amongst others two Whig members of Parliament, said: “I am glad you are come, I was just speaking about you. This,” said he, addressing the two members, “is so-and-so, the author of so-and-so, the well-known philologist; as I was telling you, I spoke to Lord A⁠⸺⁠404 this day about him, and said that he ought forthwith to have the head appointment in ⸻;405 and what did the fellow say? Why, that there was no necessity for such an appointment at all, and if there were, why ⸻ and then he hummed and ha’d. Yes,” said he, looking at the writer, “he did indeed. What a scandal! what an infamy! But I see how it will be, it will be a job. The place will be given to some son of a steward or to some quack, as I said before. Oh, these Tories! Well, if this does not make one⁠—” Here he stopped short, crunched his teeth, and looked the image of desperation.

Seeing the poor man in this distressed condition, the writer begged him to be comforted, and not to take the matter so much to heart; but the indignant Radical took the matter very much to heart, and refused all comfort whatever, bouncing about the room, and, whilst his spectacles flashed in the light of four spermaceti candles, exclaiming: “It will be a job⁠—a Tory job! I see it all, I see it all, I see it all!”

And a job it proved, and a very pretty job, but no Tory job. Shortly afterwards the Tories were out, and the Whigs were in. From that time the writer heard not a word about the injustice done to the country, in not presenting him with the appointment to ⸻;406 the Radical, however, was busy enough to obtain the appointment, not for the writer, but for himself and eventually succeeded, partly through Radical influence, and partly through that of a certain Whig lord, for whom the Radical had done, on a particular occasion, work of a particular kind. So, though the place was given to a quack, and the whole affair a very pretty job, it was one in which the Tories had certainly no hand.

In the meanwhile, however, the friendly Radical did not drop the writer. Oh, no! On various occasions he obtained from the writer all the information about the country in question, and was particularly anxious to obtain from the writer, and eventually did obtain, a copy of a work written in the court language of that country,407 edited by the writer, a language exceedingly difficult, which the writer, at the expense of a considerable portion of his eyesight, had acquired, at least as far as by the eyesight it could be acquired. What use the writer’s friend made of the knowledge he had gained from him, and what use he made of the book, the writer can only guess; but he has little doubt that when the question of sending a person to ⸻ was mooted in a Parliamentary Committee⁠—which it was at the instigation of the Radical supporters of the writer’s friend⁠—the Radical on being examined about the country, gave the information which he had obtained from the writer as his own, and flashed the book and its singular characters in the eyes of the Committee; and then of course his Radical friends would instantly say: “This is the man! there is no one like him. See what information he possesses; and see that book written by himself