Hard Times - Charles Dickens (the lemonade war series txt) 📗

putting the cap on the cow, that it became impatient of any serious reference to the Coroner’s Inquest, and brought the railway off with cheers and laughter.

Now, this gentleman had a younger brother of still better appearance than himself, who had tried life as a Cornet of Dragoons, and found it a bore; and had afterwards tried it in the train of an English minister abroad, and found it a bore; and had then strolled to Jerusalem, and got bored there; and had then gone yachting about the world, and got bored everywhere. To whom this honourable and jocular, member fraternally said one day, “Jem, there’s a good opening among the hard Fact fellows, and they want men. I wonder you don’t go in for statistics.” Jem, rather taken by the novelty of the idea, and very hard up for a change, was as ready to “go in” for statistics as for anything else. So, he went in. He coached himself up with a blue-book or two; and his brother put it about among the hard Fact fellows, and said, “If you want to bring in, for any place, a handsome dog who can make you a devilish good speech, look after my brother Jem, for he’s your man.” After a few dashes in the public meeting way, Mr. Gradgrind and a council of political sages approved of Jem, and it was resolved to send him down to Coketown, to become known there and in the neighbourhood. Hence the letter Jem had last night shown to Mrs. Sparsit, which Mr. Bounderby now held in his hand; superscribed, “Josiah Bounderby, Esquire, Banker, Coketown. Specially to introduce James Harthouse, Esquire. Thomas Gradgrind.”

Within an hour of the receipt of this dispatch and Mr. James Harthouse’s card, Mr. Bounderby put on his hat and went down to the hotel. There he found Mr. James Harthouse looking out of window, in a state of mind so disconsolate, that he was already half-disposed to “go in” for something else.

“My name, sir,” said his visitor, “is Josiah Bounderby, of Coketown.”

Mr. James Harthouse was very happy indeed (though he scarcely looked so) to have a pleasure he had long expected.

“Coketown, sir,” said Bounderby, obstinately taking a chair, “is not the kind of place you have been accustomed to. Therefore, if you will allow me⁠—or whether you will or not, for I am a plain man⁠—I’ll tell you something about it before we go any further.”

Mr. Harthouse would be charmed.

“Don’t be too sure of that,” said Bounderby. “I don’t promise it. First of all, you see our smoke. That’s meat and drink to us. It’s the healthiest thing in the world in all respects, and particularly for the lungs. If you are one of those who want us to consume it, I differ from you. We are not going to wear the bottoms of our boilers out any faster than we wear ’em out now, for all the humbugging sentiment in Great Britain and Ireland.”

By way of “going in” to the fullest extent, Mr. Harthouse rejoined, “Mr. Bounderby, I assure you I am entirely and completely of your way of thinking. On conviction.”

“I am glad to hear it,” said Bounderby. “Now, you have heard a lot of talk about the work in our mills, no doubt. You have? Very good. I’ll state the fact of it to you. It’s the pleasantest work there is, and it’s the lightest work there is, and it’s the best-paid work there is. More than that, we couldn’t improve the mills themselves, unless we laid down Turkey carpets on the floors. Which we’re not a-going to do.”

“Mr. Bounderby, perfectly right.”

“Lastly,” said Bounderby, “as to our hands. There’s not a hand in this town, sir, man, woman, or child, but has one ultimate object in life. That object is, to be fed on turtle soup and venison with a gold spoon. Now, they’re not a-going⁠—none of ’em⁠—ever to be fed on turtle soup and venison with a gold spoon. And now you know the place.”

Mr. Harthouse professed himself in the highest degree instructed and refreshed, by this condensed epitome of the whole Coketown question.

“Why, you see,” replied Mr. Bounderby, “it suits my disposition to have a full understanding with a man, particularly with a public man, when I make his acquaintance. I have only one thing more to say to you, Mr. Harthouse, before assuring you of the pleasure with which I shall respond, to the utmost of my poor ability, to my friend Tom Gradgrind’s letter of introduction. You are a man of family. Don’t you deceive yourself by supposing for a moment that I am a man of family. I am a bit of dirty riffraff, and a genuine scrap of tag, rag, and bobtail.”

If anything could have exalted Jem’s interest in Mr. Bounderby, it would have been this very circumstance. Or, so he told him.

“So now,” said Bounderby, “we may shake hands on equal terms. I say, equal terms, because although I know what I am, and the exact depth of the gutter I have lifted myself out of, better than any man does, I am as proud as you are. I am just as proud as you are. Having now asserted my independence in a proper manner, I may come to how do you find yourself, and I hope you’re pretty well.”

The better, Mr. Harthouse gave him to understand as they shook hands, for the salubrious air of Coketown. Mr. Bounderby received the answer with favour.

“Perhaps you know,” said he, “or perhaps you don’t know, I married Tom Gradgrind’s daughter. If you have nothing better to do than to walk up town with me, I shall be glad to introduce you to Tom Gradgrind’s daughter.”

“Mr. Bounderby,” said Jem, “you anticipate my dearest wishes.”

They went out without further discourse; and Mr. Bounderby piloted the new acquaintance who so strongly contrasted with him, to the private red brick dwelling, with the black outside shutters, the green inside blinds, and the black street door up the two white steps. In the drawing-room of which mansion, there presently entered to them the most remarkable