The Lamplighter | Page 3

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The Lamplighter by Charles Dickens Scanned and proofed by David Price,
[email protected]

THE LAMPLIGHTER

'If you talk of Murphy and Francis Moore, gentlemen,' said the lamplighter who was in
the chair, 'I mean to say that neither of 'em ever had any more to do with the stars than
Tom Grig had.'
'And what had HE to do with 'em?' asked the lamplighter who officiated as vice.
'Nothing at all,' replied the other; 'just exactly nothing at all.'
'Do you mean to say you don't believe in Murphy, then?' demanded the lamplighter who

had opened the discussion.
'I mean to say I believe in Tom Grig,' replied the chairman. 'Whether I believe in Murphy,
or not, is a matter between me and my conscience; and whether Murphy believes in
himself, or not, is a matter between him and his conscience. Gentlemen, I drink your
healths.'
The lamplighter who did the company this honour, was seated in the chimney-corner of a
certain tavern, which has been, time out of mind, the Lamplighters' House of Call. He sat
in the midst of a circle of lamplighters, and was the cacique, or chief of the tribe.
If any of our readers have had the good fortune to behold a lamplighter's funeral, they
will not be surprised to learn that lamplighters are a strange and primitive people; that
they rigidly adhere to old ceremonies and customs which have been handed down among
them from father to son since the first public lamp was lighted out of doors; that they
intermarry, and betroth their children in infancy; that they enter into no plots or
conspiracies (for who ever heard of a traitorous lamplighter?); that they commit no
crimes against the laws of their country (there being no instance of a murderous or
burglarious lamplighter); that they are, in short, notwithstanding their apparently volatile
and restless character, a highly moral and reflective people: having among themselves as
many traditional observances as the Jews, and being, as a body, if not as old as the hills,
at least as old as the streets. It is an article of their creed that the first faint glimmering of
true civilisation shone in the first street-light maintained at the public expense. They trace
their existence and high position in the public esteem, in a direct line to the heathen
mythology; and hold that the history of Prometheus himself is but a pleasant fable,
whereof the true hero is a lamplighter.
'Gentlemen,' said the lamplighter in the chair, 'I drink your healths.'
'And perhaps, Sir,' said the vice, holding up his glass, and rising a little way off his seat
and sitting down again, in token that he recognised and returned the compliment, 'perhaps
you will add to that condescension by telling us who Tom Grig was, and how he came to
be connected in your mind with Francis Moore, Physician.'
'Hear, hear, hear!' cried the lamplighters generally.
'Tom Grig, gentlemen,' said the chairman, 'was one of us; and it happened to him, as it
don't often happen to a public character in our line, that he had his what-you-may-call-it
cast.'
'His head?' said the vice.
'No,' replied the chairman, 'not his head.'
'His face, perhaps?' said the vice. 'No, not his face.' 'His legs?' 'No, not his legs.' Nor yet
his arms, nor his hands, nor his feet, nor his chest, all of which were severally suggested.
'His nativity, perhaps?'

'That's it,' said the chairman, awakening from his thoughtful attitude at the suggestion.
'His nativity. That's what Tom had cast, gentlemen.'
'In plaster?' asked the vice.
'I don't rightly know how it's done,' returned the chairman. 'But I suppose it was.'
And there he stopped as if that were all he had to say; whereupon there arose a murmur
among the company, which at length resolved itself into a request, conveyed through the
vice, that he would go on. This being exactly what the chairman wanted, he mused for a
little time, performed that agreeable ceremony which is popularly termed wetting one's
whistle, and