FullReads

As for John Pendennis, as the father of the family, and that sort of thing, everybody had the greatest respect for him: and his orders were obeyed like those of the Medes and Persians. His hat was as well brushed perhaps as that of any man in this empire. His meals were served at the same minute every day, and woe to those who came late, as little Pen, a disorderly little rascal, sometimes did. Prayers were recited, his letters were read, his business despatched, his stables and garden inspected, his hen-houses and kennel, his barn and pig-sty visited, always at regular hours. After dinner he always had a nap with the Globe newspaper on his knee, and his yellow bandanna handkerchief on his face. And so, as his dinner took place at six o’clock to a minute, and the sunset business alluded to may be supposed to have occurred at half-past seven, it is probable that he did not much care for the view in front of his lawn windows, or take any share in the poetry and caresses which were taking place there.

They seldom occurred in his presence. However frisky they were before, mother and child were hushed and quiet when Mr. Pendennis walked into the drawing-room, his newspaper under his arm. And here, while little Pen, buried in a great chair, read all the books on which he could lay hold, the Squire perused his own articles in the Gardener’s Gazette, or took a solemn hand at piquet with Mrs. Pendennis, or an occasional friend from the village.

As for Mrs. Pendennis, she was conspicuous for her tranquil beauty, her natural sweetness and kindness, and that simplicity and dignity which purity and innocence are sure to bestow upon a handsome woman, and during her son’s childhood and youth the boy thought of her as little less than an angel, a supernatural being, all wisdom, love and beauty. But Mrs. Pendennis had one weakness,–pride of family. She spoke of Mr. Pendennis as if he had been the Pope of Rome on his throne, and she a cardinal kneeling at his feet, and giving him incense. Mr. Pendennis’s brother, the Major, she held to be a sort of Bayard among Majors, and as for her son Arthur, she worshipped that youth with an ardour which the young scapegrace accepted almost as coolly as the statue of the saint in St. Peter’s receives the rapturous kisses which the faithful deliver on his toe.

Notwithstanding his mother’s worship of him, Arthur Pendennis’s school-fellows at the Grey Friars School state that as a boy he was in no way remarkable either as a dunce or as a scholar. He never read to improve himself out of school-hours, but on the contrary devoured all the novels, plays and poetry he could get hold of. He never was flogged, but it was a wonder how he escaped the whippingpost. When he had money he spent it royally in tarts for himself and his friends, and had been known to disburse nine and sixpence out of ten shillings awarded to him in a single day. When he had no funds he went on tick. When he could get no credit he went without, and was almost as happy. He had been known to take a thrashing for a crony without saying a word; but a blow ever so slight from a friend would make him roar. To fighting he was averse from his earliest youth, and indeed to physic, the Greek Grammar, or any other exertion, and would engage in none of them, except at the last extremity. He seldom if ever told lies, and never bullied little boys. Those masters or seniors who were kind to him, he loved with boyish ardour. And though the Doctor, when he did not know his Horace, or could not construe his Greek play, said that that boy Pendennis was a disgrace to the school, a candidate for ruin in this world, and perdition in the next; a profligate who would most likely bring his venerable father to ruin and his mother to a dishonoured grave, and the like–yet as the Doctor made use of these compliments to most of the boys in the place, little Pen, at first uneasy and terrified by these charges, became gradually accustomed to hear them; and he has not, in fact, either murdered his parents or committed any act worthy of transportation or hanging up to the present day.