Mudfog and Other Sketches | Page 9

he
read up for the subject, and determined to come out on the corporation
with a burst, the very next time the licence was applied for.
The licensing day came, and the red-faced landlord of the Jolly
Boatmen walked into the town-hall, looking as jolly as need be, having
actually put on an extra fiddle for that night, to commemorate the
anniversary of the Jolly Boatmen's music licence. It was applied for in
due form, and was just about to be granted as a matter of course, when
up rose Nicholas Tulrumble, and drowned the astonished corporation in
a torrent of eloquence. He descanted in glowing terms upon the
increasing depravity of his native town of Mudfog, and the excesses

committed by its population. Then, he related how shocked he had been,
to see barrels of beer sliding down into the cellar of the Jolly Boatmen
week after week; and how he had sat at a window opposite the Jolly
Boatmen for two days together, to count the people who went in for
beer between the hours of twelve and one o'clock alone--which,
by-the-bye, was the time at which the great majority of the Mudfog
people dined. Then, he went on to state, how the number of people who
came out with beer-jugs, averaged twenty-one in five minutes, which,
being multiplied by twelve, gave two hundred and fifty-two people
with beer-jugs in an hour, and multiplied again by fifteen (the number
of hours during which the house was open daily) yielded three
thousand seven hundred and eighty people with beer-jugs per day, or
twenty-six thousand four hundred and sixty people with beer-jugs, per
week. Then he proceeded to show that a tambourine and moral
degradation were synonymous terms, and a fiddle and vicious
propensities wholly inseparable. All these arguments he strengthened
and demonstrated by frequent references to a large book with a blue
cover, and sundry quotations from the Middlesex magistrates; and in
the end, the corporation, who were posed with the figures, and sleepy
with the speech, and sadly in want of dinner into the bargain, yielded
the palm to Nicholas Tulrumble, and refused the music licence to the
Jolly Boatmen.
But although Nicholas triumphed, his triumph was short. He carried on
the war against beer-jugs and fiddles, forgetting the time when he was
glad to drink out of the one, and to dance to the other, till the people
hated, and his old friends shunned him. He grew tired of the lonely
magnificence of Mudfog Hall, and his heart yearned towards the
Lighterman's Arms. He wished he had never set up as a public man,
and sighed for the good old times of the coal- shop, and the chimney
corner.
At length old Nicholas, being thoroughly miserable, took heart of grace,
paid the secretary a quarter's wages in advance, and packed him off to
London by the next coach. Having taken this step, he put his hat on his
head, and his pride in his pocket, and walked down to the old room at
the Lighterman's Arms. There were only two of the old fellows there,
and they looked coldly on Nicholas as he proffered his hand.
'Are you going to put down pipes, Mr. Tulrumble?' said one.

'Or trace the progress of crime to 'bacca?' growled another.
'Neither,' replied Nicholas Tulrumble, shaking hands with them both,
whether they would or not. 'I've come down to say that I'm very sorry
for having made a fool of myself, and that I hope you'll give me up the
old chair, again.'
The old fellows opened their eyes, and three or four more old fellows
opened the door, to whom Nicholas, with tears in his eyes, thrust out
his hand too, and told the same story. They raised a shout of joy, that
made the bells in the ancient church-tower vibrate again, and wheeling
the old chair into the warm corner, thrust old Nicholas down into it, and
ordered in the very largest- sized bowl of hot punch, with an unlimited
number of pipes, directly.
The next day, the Jolly Boatmen got the licence, and the next night, old
Nicholas and Ned Twigger's wife led off a dance to the music of the
fiddle and tambourine, the tone of which seemed mightily improved by
a little rest, for they never had played so merrily before. Ned Twigger
was in the very height of his glory, and he danced hornpipes, and
balanced chairs on his chin, and straws on his nose, till the whole
company, including the corporation, were in raptures of admiration at
the brilliancy of his acquirements.
Mr. Tulrumble, junior, couldn't make up his mind to be anything but
magnificent, so he went up to London and drew bills on his father; and
when he had overdrawn, and got into debt,