Mrs Lirripers Legacy | Page 7

very low
and haughty and parted, and whenever Mr. Buffle made his rounds in
future him and the Major always met and bowed before the Airy
railings, putting me much in mind of Hamlet and the other gentleman
in mourning before killing one another, though I could have wished the
other gentleman had done it fairer and even if less polite no poison.
Mr. Buffle's family were not liked in this neighbourhood, for when you
are a householder my dear you'll find it does not come by nature to like
the Assessed, and it was considered besides that a one-horse pheayton
ought not to have elevated Mrs. Buffle to that height especially when
purloined from the Taxes which I myself did consider uncharitable. But
they were NOT liked and there was that domestic unhappiness in the
family in consequence of their both being very hard with Miss Buffle
and one another on account of Miss Buffle's favouring Mr. Buffle's
articled young gentleman, that it WAS whispered that Miss Buffle
would go either into a consumption or a convent she being so very thin
and off her appetite and two close- shaved gentlemen with white bands

round their necks peeping round the corner whenever she went out in
waistcoats resembling black pinafores. So things stood towards Mr.
Buffle when one night I was woke by a frightful noise and a smell of
burning, and going to my bedroom window saw the whole street in a
glow. Fortunately we had two sets empty just then and before I could
hurry on some clothes I heard the Major hammering at the attics' doors
and calling out "Dress yourselves!--Fire! Don't be frightened!--Fire!
Collect your presence of mind!--Fire! All right--Fire!" most
tremenjously. As I opened my bedroom door the Major came tumbling
in over himself and me, and caught me in his arms. "Major" I says
breathless "where is it?" "I don't know dearest madam" says the
Major--"Fire! Jemmy Jackman will defend you to the last drop of his
blood--Fire! If the dear boy was at home what a treat this would be for
him--Fire!" and altogether very collected and bold except that he
couldn't say a single sentence without shaking me to the very centre
with roaring Fire. We ran down to the drawing-room and put our heads
out of window, and the Major calls to an unfeeling young monkey,
scampering by be joyful and ready to split "Where is it?--Fire!" The
monkey answers without stopping "O here's a lark! Old Buffle's been
setting his house alight to prevent its being found out that he boned the
Taxes. Hurrah! Fire!" And then the sparks came flying up and the
smoke came pouring down and the crackling of flames and spatting of
water and banging of engines and hacking of axes and breaking of glass
and knocking at doors and the shouting and crying and hurrying and the
heat and altogether gave me a dreadful palpitation. "Don't be frightened
dearest madam," says the Major, "--Fire! There's nothing to be alarmed
at--Fire! Don't open the street door till I come back--Fire! I'll go and
see if I can be of any service--Fire! You're quite composed and
comfortable ain't you?--Fire, Fire, Fire!" It was in vain for me to hold
the man and tell him he'd be galloped to death by the engines--pumped
to death by his over-exertions--wet-feeted to death by the slop and
mess-- flattened to death when the roofs fell in--his spirit was up and he
went scampering off after the young monkey with all the breath he had
and none to spare, and me and the girls huddled together at the parlour
windows looking at the dreadful flames above the houses over the way,
Mr. Buffle's being round the corner. Presently what should we see but
some people running down the street straight to our door, and then the

Major directing operations in the busiest way, and then some more
people and then--carried in a chair similar to Guy Fawkes- -Mr. Buffle
in a blanket!
My dear the Major has Mr. Buffle brought up our steps and whisked
into the parlour and carted out on the sofy, and then he and all the rest
of them without so much as a word burst away again full speed leaving
the impression of a vision except for Mr. Buffle awful in his blanket
with his eyes a rolling. In a twinkling they all burst back again with
Mrs. Buffle in another blanket, which whisked in and carted out on the
sofy they all burst off again and all burst back again with Miss Buffle
in another blanket, which again whisked in and carted out they all burst
off again and all burst back again with Mr. Buffle's articled young
gentleman in another blanket--him a holding round the necks